Mobius High
by HA19
Summary: A two-tailed fox with a dysfunctional family makes his way through high school. He thought the new year would be the same as always, but was very mistaken. All characters are OCs. There are no official Sonic characters; setting is in Sonic world.
1. Chapter 1

**This fanfic has been going on for awhile on a couple of forums, but I've finally decided to put it here. :P There's already many chapters finished, but to keep the suspense, I'll release one every Monday. (Excluding the 1st chapter of course. :P) Enjoy.**

I walked into school with a proud smile on my face. Eleventh grade had just begun, and I knew it was going to go well. I had straight-As last year, all the teachers loved me, and I'd gotten a ton of girls' numbers. Yep, I had a feeling this year would be the same, only better. As soon as I stepped inside with my cool shades on, a million girls rushed up to me.

"Sup girls." I said. They all sighed with happiness. One of them ran up to me.

"Hey H.A….." She said sly fully.

"Hello beautiful." I said in a cool tone.

"Wake up!" She yelled in my ear. I jumped back started.

"What the hell!?" I yelled back. She walked up to me again, she slowly started to look like my mom for some reason.

"What up you lazy bum!" She yelled again. I was completely confused, but it all started to make sense.

I awoke in my bed, and shook my head. Just a dream, of course. My life couldn't be that perfect. As I got out of bed, I let out a loud yawn. Apparently today actually is the first day of Eleventh grade for me. I really didn't want to go in actuality. That dream was complete bull to me. I stumbled to the shower, stripped down, and jumped in. I had forgot to warm up the water in my sleepiness, and was greeted by freezing water. This caused me to fall over in surprise.

Soon enough, the water warmed up, and I could finally shower in peace. Of course, peace doesn't last very long in this household. I heard the door open, and someone began to brush their teeth.

"Hey Shawn…" I said quietly, knowing it was him. "Can't you see I'm in the shower?"

"Come on! It'll only take me a minute to brush my teeth!" He groaned. I rolled my eyes in the shower.

"Whatever." I said. Shawn really loved to pull tricks on me just because I was his brother. Sometimes he was awesome, but most of the time, say 99% of the time, he's a pain.

"O.K….I'm done." He said, and then turned the hot water in the sink on and left the bathroom. This caused the water in the shower to cool down and I was once again greeted by cold water.

"Damnit Shawn!" I yelled as I just shut the water in the shower off. I was finished anyway.

"H.A.! Watch your language." I heard my mother yell from down the hall. I growled angrily. Shawn always got the better of arguments or anything. If he did anything wrong, it was clearly my fault for no apparent reason.

"H.A.! Where are you? Breakfast is getting cold!" My mother yelled.

"I still need to get dressed!" I yelled back, wrapping a towel around myself. I was still dripping wet, so I tried to shake some of the water off my fur, which made it all puffed up.

"Great….just what I needed…" I sighed. I hated having to comb my fur down. I was a guy, and only girls should have to comb their fur. I just stared at myself in the mirror while doing so. I looked at my two tails in the mirror and sighed. It just felt so weird to be one of the only two-tailed foxes in the word. I felt like a freak. Even my dad thought I was a freak.

"H.A.! Come on!" My mother yelled again. Her voice had started to annoy me over the years. It wasn't getting any better I can tell you that.

"Still busy!" I yelled back. When will adults figure out that teens need more than six minutes to get ready?

"Well, the school bus is going to be here in a few minutes and you're still not ready!" She said. She got me on this one. I woke up late this morning, took a long shower, and to top it all off, I spent five minutes fixing my fur. Not a good way to rush in the morning.

"Alright, alright!" I said running to my room. While opening the drawers with one hand, the other was brushing my teeth at the same time. All I had time to throw on a was a white T-Shirt and khaki pants. There was absolutely no time to choose my clothes. I suddenly heard a honk outside.

_  
_"H.A.! That's the bus!" My mom yelled, once again.

"Crap….." I said out loud. No time for breakfast, I guess. As I sprinted out the door, I grabbed my red coat and threw it on. It was pretty chili for September. Thankfully, I caught the bus in time, and threw myself into a seat in the back, where I was greeted by my only two friends, Ian and Dwayne.

Dwayne and I had been friends since only last year. He was a orange hedgehog, and only moved here recently. Unlike most people, he didn't make fun of me because of my tails. In fact, he thought it was really cool, and would always hang out with me and Ian.

Ian and I had been friends for as long as I could remember. Grade school was the worst time ever for me. Everyone would call me a freak and make fun of me. Needless to say, I didn't have any friends, except for Ian. He would always be at my side. In fact, he looked a lot like me. Red fur, yelled tipped tail, and was virtually my height. The only major difference was the fact I had two tails, but he didn't care. Unlike Dwayne even, he didn't say anything about my tails. It was like he didn't even know they were there, but I liked that. It made me feel a little normal anyway.

"So….everyone…explain your summers!" I said looking at them. "We all know I did absolutely nothing."

"Of course….H.A. you lead a very boring life. I mean there's nothing special about you or anything." Dwayne said in a very sarcastic tone. I growled.

"Not very funny….I hate it when you just bring my tails into a conversation. It's virtually like making fun of me." I said rolling my eyes.

"Heh…my bad." He said with a weak smile. "Well….my summer was pretty cool….I got hooked up with a girl."

"No kidding?" Ian said with a curious glance.

"Yeah…too bad she doesn't go to Mobius High. She's home-schooled." Dwayne said with a sigh. "I only get to see her on weekends."

"So…what's her name?" I asked, really wanting to know.

"Trish. She can be very spunky at times as well. I like that about her." He started to laugh. "Oh! And she HATES the romantic type of stuff, which means she'll probably hate you H.A."

"You make that sound as if I want to meet her." I said stiffly.

"You don't?" Dwayne said with a bit of sadness. I chuckled.

"Of course I do. You think I wouldn't want to meet my friend's girl?" I said. "I'll come down some weekend to see her, unless you plan of bringing her to your house or something."

"Well, that is the plan." Dwayne said with a thumbs up. "Most likely this weekend, by the way."

"Alright, alright! My turn to tell a tale!" Ian said bumping in.

"O.K….what did you do this summer Ian?" I said with a smirk.

"Absolutely….nothing!" He said with the most enthusiasm possible. It made all three of us laugh hysterically. Before we could even tell, the bus had already arrived at school.

"That was quick. Oh! Guys, we gotta check each others schedules out, even though you're the little one in the group Ian." I scoffed.

"Shut up! I'm only one grade down from you guys." He scolded back at me.

We looked at each others schedules, seeing what classes we have together. Miraculously, Ian had a few classes with me, only second and fourth period, and Dwayne and I had the first 4 classes together, second period being study hall. We all we satisfied by the set-up. It could have been worse. We could have had no classes together at all.

"I'll see you guys inside." I said waving, as I walked to my locker. Then, I decided to give my schedule a closer look.

"Let's see. First period is chemistry. That sounds like fun. Messing with chemicals, creating awesome stuff. I'll like that." I wasn't paying attention to where I was going while reading. "Second period is study hall. I have that with Dwayne, so we can pal around." I was unknowing walking toward someone. "Third period is gym. God I hate gym….." Then, I bumped into the person. Their books went flying, and I found myself on the ground.

I shook my head. "My bad….I wasn't looking where I was going." Then, I stopped talking. I looked over at the person I had bumped into. It was a cute blue hedgehog girl with pink bangs. She had a red head band on her head, and sky blue eyes. My heart just pounded loudly, and I rushed over to help her pick up her books.

"I'm so sorry! Let me help you pick these up." I said nervously. She chuckled.

"It's alright…I wasn't looking where I was going either. "I'm Kari." She said holding out her hand.

"I'm H.A." I said shaking her hand, then handed her the books.

"That's an odd set of initials for a name." She said curiously.

"It's a long story. Trust me, you don't want to hear it." I said.

"Well….I'll see you later then." She said.

"Wait! Why do we compare schedules or something. It would be cool to know when to see you." I said, blushing a little.

"Aww…that's sweet of you. Sure, let's take a look." As we compared schedules, I noticed that hers was almost the same as Ian's.

"What grade are you in?" I asked.

"Oh! I'm a sophomore." She said. "What about you?"

"I'm a junior." I answered. "Only two more years in this place, then I'm done."

She giggled. "I assume you don't like it here."

"You got that right, for a couple of obvious reasons." I said, wishing I hadn't said that.

"Like what?" She asked curiously. I froze up. She hadn't noticed my two tails yet. What if she hated me? What if she called me a freak too? I couldn't like a girl I liked call me a freak, it would hurt too much. I sighed, and took a chance.

"Well…..look." I spun around quick, and she saw my two tails. Her eyes opened wide.

"Two tails?" She started to laugh. I frowned sadly. I knew she was gunna start making fun of me. To my surprise she said something else.

"Is that all? That's funny. How could something small like that make you hate this place?" She said. I felt happy when she called it a 'Small' thing.

"You're not gunna make fun of me, or call me names because of them? Everyone else does." I said looking down.

"Well, those people are wrong and are real big jerks." Kari said.

"Thank you! Someone on the same page as me." I said. That made Kari laugh.

"Well…shouldn't we be getting to our lockers?" She asked.

"Right." I said and we headed to our lockers. When I got to mine, I looked at her, and saw she was standing right next to me.

"Our lockers are right next to each other?" I asked. She nodded.

"Isn't that cool?" She said smiling. "Now we can really get to know each other."

"Uhh….yeah….th-that sounds cool." I stuttered. Wait, why am I stuttering? I can normally talk fine around girls, but her….I find myself stuttering.

"So, H.A…..I gotta ask…." She started.

"Don't tell me." I interrupted. "You wanna know more about my tails right?"

"Actually, no. I want to know what you think about my hair." She said.

"Your hair?" I said confused. "Why?"

"I just got it dyed yesterday. I know I like it, but I want to know what other people think."

I smiled. "I think it looks great, but…why should you care about other people's opinions, when you know yourself you like it?"

"That's some pretty good logic, H.A. Where do you get that from?" She asked. I blushed.

"No one actually…I kinda…make up a bunch of things that I follow."

"Like what else?" She asked.

"Of course, the number one thing on my 'List' is smoking, drinking, and so forth. I will NEVER do anything like that. Why should I waste time doing things that are just going to hurt me later on in life, you know?" I said.

"Wow….I've never heard someone your age say something like that." She giggled. "That's cute. It's very mature."

I blushed once again. "Well…uh…." The bell rang suddenly, thankfully. "Shoot! That's the bell. I'll see you next period!" I ran off to class. Kari laughed again.

"He's something else." She said walking to her next class.

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**There you have it; the first chapter. I wrote this one a long time ago, and I'm not completely satisfied with the language. You'll notice as each chapter goes on, my writing will get back. That's because I've been taking English 101 in college, and my professor is VERY strict with getting things done right. He's helped me break a lot of bad habits, and I'm happy to take a few Bs and Cs to become a better writer. :P**

**Read and review please! I would really appreciate it.**

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	2. Chapter 2

**I'm glad to see such positive reviews already. :D On the topic of bringing OCs into the fanfic, I've never even thought of doing that. :P Well, since a lot of chapters are already finished, I'll think about adding OCs in the later chapters. If you want to send me a description of your character, shoot me a PM rather than putting them in a review.**

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The first class was moving so slow; especially since I wanted to get to second period as soon as possible. I really wanted to talk to Kari. She's the first girl I've ever met that I actually had a decent conversation with. Not to mention, she was very cute. She was on my mind the whole time throughout class. Suddenly, I got a whack to the back of my head.

"Ow!" I said holding my head. I looked over and see Dwayne laughing.

"Dude…you were day-dreaming." He said with a grin. "What the hell could you be thinking about on the first day of school? Missing summer already?"

"No….." I said rolling my eyes.

Suddenly, the announcements started and I could not believe whose voice I heard through the speakers.

"Welcome to the first day of the new year everyone!" Kari's voice boomed throughout the school.

"Kari's saying the announcements? I've never seen a new kid do them before" I said out loud.

"Who's Kari?" Dwayne asked, and then I realized I said that out loud.

"She's just a girl I ran into before I came to class." I said like it was nothing. Dwayne grinned though.

"Oh….so **she's** the one you were day-dreaming about." He let out a quick chuckle. I hit him in the arm.

"Was not! I just met her in the hall." I lied.

"Admit it! You like her. There's nothing wrong with that." He said.

"H.A.! Dwayne! Be quiet during the announcements!" The teacher shouted at us.

"Sorry…" We both said, as Kari finished up with something about a school dance. I really wasn't paying attention to it.

The rest of the class period continued to take an entirety. The clock laughed at me; going as slow as it possible could. As much fun as chemistry will be, I was bored out of my mind right now. All the teacher was talking about was stupid safety procedures and other things. To me, he was rambling on about useless nonsense. I glanced back at the clock. Still five more minutes till the class period ends.

"H.A.….." Dwayne whispered.

"Hmmm?" I looked over to his attention.

"Kari and H.A.…sounds like a good couple." He chuckled again. I sighed and turned back around.

Finally the bell rang, and all the kids rushed to leave class, including me.

"Why the rush? Miss your girlfriend?" He snickered.

"You give a guy an inch; he takes a mile." I said trying to ignore him.

I didn't want to say it, but Dwayne was right. I really wanted to see Kari again, and now I could. Next period should be very enjoyable. As I walked to my locker, I saw Kari at hers, and my stomach felt light again. I tried to ignore it, and looked over at her.

"Hey Kari…" I said. She turned and looked at me.

"Hi H.A." She said smiled.

"How was first period for you?" I asked.

"It was O.K., I guess." She said putting some books away in her locker. "What about you?"

"Very ,very boring. I think I could have died of boredom." I said. Kari laughed.

"Well, I hope you don't. You're fun to talk to." She said back.

"Thanks." I said, happy with her statement. "Same goes for you."

"Let's go to class. We'll have all period to talk there." She said grabbing my hand suddenly. I was a bit startled by this, but followed her to class. As we entered the room, I was greeted by Dwayne's jokes yet again.

"So cute…holding hands." He joked. I rolled my eyes once again.

"That's Dwayne." I said sighing. "He can be a jerk sometimes, but he's one of my only friends. I'm sure you met Ian last period, right?"

She nodded. "He helped the time go by faster. We talked about random things all period."

"Cool." I said.

"You know….you can let go of my hand now." She said giggling. I blushed letting go of her hand, and tried to make an excuse for it.

"Hey….you're the one who grabbed my hand first." I said trying not to stutter.

"Yeah, but…you didn't seem to care that I did." She said back. I just shrugged.

"So…what did Ian and you talk about last period?" I asked curiously.

"Oh, just how our summer was basically." She said as we sat down.

"I take it you talked much more than Ian." I chuckled.

She laughed. "No. He actually had a pretty interesting summer."

"What else did you talk about?" I asked. Kari wondered why I was asking all this. Hell, I didn't even know.

"Not much really." She said. I decided to stop asking these random questions and stick with normal ones.

"So….what did you do during the summer?"

"Well….we spent the last two weeks moving out of my house. That was a load of work." She said as I watched Ian walk in the room.

"That had to suck." I looked over at Ian and waved. "Yo!"

"Hey. How was chemistry?" He asked.

"Boring as hell. Ask Dwayne. He'll tell you the same thing." I said.

"Heh….oh hi Kari." Ian said.

"Hey Ian!" She said happily as she stood up and gave him a hug. Then, Ian sat down by Dwayne to talk, and Kari sat down by me again. The sudden show of affection left me curious.

"So…..um….you two got to know each other pretty well last period I assume?" I asked. She nodded.

"Ian's a great guy. I had a lot of fun chatting with him last period." She said smiling.

"Oh….cool…hey! I heard you on the announcements this morning." I said trying to change the subject. Last thing I wanted is her talking about how awesome Ian was.

"Oh yeah. I don't know why the principal came to me, seeing as I'm new here, but I accepted the responsibility. How was I?" She asked.

"Very good. I might actually listen to the announcements this year." Kari laughed again.

"You and Ian are so very alike with your witty comments. Did you listen to them this time?"

"Nah…I didn't know you were going to be doing them. I'll make sure to listen to them tomorrow." I said smiling.

"That's sweet of you." She said.

"I did hear the last thing about a school dance though. Think you could repeat that for me?" I asked. Kari took out a piece of paper and cleared her throat.

"Friday is the Dance of the New School Year. Make sure to bring all your friends and family. Admission is free. The Dance starts at Six." She recited from the paper.

"Very good. You should consider be the announcer next year as well." I said.

"So….are you going to the dance?" She asked me. My stomach felt light at that question. I know where this could be possibly leading.

"Eh…I…I never go to school dances." I mumbled. Kari gave me an odd look.

"Why not?" I just pointed at my tails. "Oh….."

"I sometimes wish I never had them." I sighed.

"I think you would be even weirder being a fox with no tails." She giggled.

"True! You got me there!" I laughed.

"But seriously….don't let people just push you around because of that, H.A." She said.

"I try not to, but it's impossible. I bet I could take being a geek or something and get pushed around by people because I at least have other geek friends. But….with this second tail….**everyone** pushes me around. You don't see any other two-tailed foxes walking around here." I said with a sigh. "I have three friends in this entire school of over two-thousand kids. Those are pretty bad numbers."

"Your friends are better than everyone else though." She said. "Just because they hang out with you." I felt a sudden build in happiness from her saying this. It's like everything she says to me makes me happy. Wow, I love this girl. Wait….did I just say love!?

"Th-thanks….you know….b-back on the subject of the school dance." I stuttered. She looked at me weirdly.

"What about it?" She asked. I cleared my throat.

"I was just wondering….would you…." I needed to ask this and it get it over with. "Like to go to the dance with me?"

She stared at me with a straight face. It was silent for a minute or two, but she finally spoke. Her answer, I did not like. "Hmmm….you know, Ian asked me that same thing last period." My mind melted. Ian!? No no no no no! Is he moving on to her? This is bad; very bad!

"Oh….I see…." I said with my head down.

"But I turned him down." I lifted my head back up.

"What?" I said surprised.

"I'd love to go with you." She said with a smile. A smile appeared across my face as well.

"Really?" I said with a cheery tone. "But…why'd you turn Ian down?"

"I dunno. You and Ian are so very alike but…." She put her hand through my hair. "There's something about you that I like." And the winner of the happiest person on the planet contest? H.A.! Take a bow!

"So…it's a….it's a…" I stuttered.

"Date? Yeah…it's a date." She said smiling. Suddenly, the bell rang, and we all got up to leave.

"I'll see you later at lunch?" I said. She nodded as she left the classroom. Dwayne ran up to me really quick.

"So! What did you two discuss?" Dwayne asked.

"Well, I've got a date to the school dance Friday now." I said with a smile.

"Damn…really? Congrats dude!" Dwayne said, giving me a high-five. "So…next up gym right? I bet you're so excited for that."

"Oh yeah….great…" I said sarcastically. "Ian? Come on, you're gunna be late to your next class."

He stood up. "I don't get it. I asked her to the dance last period, and she said no. How'd you get her to say yes.?" I knew where this was heading, but I just shrugged.

"Look…don't worry about it too much, bro. There are hundreds of girls in this school. I'm sure one is bound to want-"

"A sexy guy like myself?" He said finishing my sentence for me. I let out a pity laugh.

"Well, I wasn't going there, but yeah." I turned back around. "Now let's get going to class. I don't want to be late to gym. That's like death." Dwayne nodded as we headed off to class. Ian still stood there. He was not happy that Kari turned him down, but gladly agreed to go to the dance with me.

"God damn it…I'll never understand girls. She even said herself that H.A. and I are like the same person…whatever. She probably has some stupid fetish for two-tailed animals or something." He laughed as he left the classroom. "Yeah…that's it."

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**I'm thinking about updating Thursday and Monday for a few weeks just to get chapters up. So, you'll be seeing a new chapter Thursday!**

**Kitsune Disciple:** Thanks for the review. I've definitely left a lot of questions in the first chapter. Don't worry, all will be answered in time. :)

**kyuubihikari:** Thanks. I try to give each character their own unique personalities. I hope I answered your question before the chapter.

**cloveria1215: **Thanks. :D

**Sir Chase Vonvit:** Thanks. I'll try to keep updates frequent. :)

**Hedgehog B. Rebecca:** Nice character. I'll see about OCs later.


	3. Chapter 3

**Here it is. Thursday as promised. The great thing about having a lot of chapters ready before releasing it is never missing an update. :P Enjoy.**

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As the day went on, it seemed that everyone in the school knew that Kari and I were going to the dance together. It was obvious that was going to happen, since I was the freak of the school after all. Kari was walking down the hall before lunch and noticed a lot of girls whispering to each other, eying her, and giggling. She rolled her eyes as she continued walking. There was no reason for her to get involved, until one girl said something out loud.

"Look! The new girl and the two-tailed freak are going to the dance together, how sweet! Maybe they'll get married and have little freak children!" A lot of kids started laughing then. Kari may have been a patient person, but she had to stand up for herself. She walked up to the girl and the argument began.

"What's your problem?" She asked in a raised voice.

"Come on, Kari. The two-tailed fox?" Another girl said. "You're like, one of the more popular girls at school already. Every guy in the school would want to go to the dance with you, and yet you're taking the freak?"

"Stop calling H.A. a freak! Another tail doesn't make him a monster!" Kari yelled.

"Why don't you go with Ian?" Someone else asked. It's like no one was listening to Kari at all.

"Oh yeah! That's a great idea, even though he hangs out with _him._" As the gossip started back up.

"Yeah, but…he's cute, not like that freak H.A. at all." Kari slammed a locker closed and everyone immediately looked at her again.

"Look…while you all think it's funny to gang up on someone because they're different, it's not right." She said in a more calm tone.

"You're never going to get through to them Kari." Ian said walking up. "Kids will gossip and continue to no matter what you say. It's high school. It happens all the time." Some girls sighed when Ian walked up, even if he was against them in this argument.

"I know….but…." She sniffed and her eyes looked a little puffed up.

"Aww…is the freak's girlfriend gunna cry?" Some guy said, before I whacked him in the back of the head.

"You guys done tormenting her yet?" I asked. No one answered as I continued walking down the hallway. "Thought so."

The kids at this school have reached a new low. Treating me like dirt was one thing, but doing it to Kari now because we're going to a stupid damn dance? I wanted to kill all of them right where they stood, but I knew I shouldn't stoop to their level of stupidity.

"Hey Ian." I said walking over. "Are you alright Kari?"

She nodded. "God…I need to knock one of those girls out before the end of the year."

I laughed. "Sounds like a plan." I could tell they were listening to us. "Jesus Christ people….quit the eavesdropping."

"I love your new girlfriend, H.A. She's so fun to mess with." Some kid said. Apparently they don't stay quiet for very long.

"Yeah, but nothing is as fun as messing with the freak himself." As the talk continued, Ian, Kari, and I left and headed for the lunch room.

"Are you sure you're O.K., Kari?" I asked. She clearly looked like she wanted to cry.

"I've just….never had everyone gang up on me at once. I felt so hopeless because there was no one on my side." She said, wiping her face.

"Well…that's what I've been telling you. I'm on my own in school whenever Ian or Dwayne aren't around." I put my arm around her to try and comfort her.

"Speaking of which, where is Dwayne?" Ian asked.

"Knowing him, he's probably already eating lunch. Oh, by the way, Ian, have you had any luck finding a date to the dance?" I followed up. It would be a relief for me if Ian had found someone so I don't have to worry about him trying to get with Kari, which I was pretty suspicious of.

He shook his head. "I've been turned down countless times. I guess no one likes the 'Best Friend of a Freak.'" He put his hands up to emphasize the last part. Kari couldn't help but be confused by his answer, seeing how the girls acted when Ian came along earlier

"Anyway…I'll catch you guys in the lunch room." Ian said walking away.

"Ummm…H.A…" Kari said.

"Yeah?"

"You realize your arm is still around me." She said with a slight laugh.

"Right, right!" I said taking my arm off of her real quick and my cheeks got slightly red. "Glad to know you're still in a good mood."

"How do you get through every day like this, H.A.?" Kari asked. "Constantly teased, with no one on your side."

"One word." I said turning her toward me. "Ignore."

"Ignore?" She questioned.

"Exactly. You ignore them, and the amount of talk about you stays lower than if you interfere. While it doesn't solve the problem, it keeps it to a minimum." I said.

"Haven't you ever tried to get people to stop?" She asked.

"Look…you saw what happened when you interfered right? It just got worse and worse." I grabbed her hand. "Come on, let's get some lunch."

Kari was very surprised at my tone. She was also very surprised that I had grabbed her hand this time. Hopefully it didn't freak her out or anything. I know I liked her, but I don't know if she had the same feelings or not. We grabbed lunch and sat at a table. Of course, it was just the four of us.

"Welcome to the table of losers, Kari." Dwayne said smirked. Ian smacked him in the back of the head.

"Dude, she went through some huge thing in the hall. Be a little nicer, m'kay?" He said and let out a guilty smile.

"My bad, my bad….so, what happened anyway?" He asked, still shoveling his face full of food. How he eats like that, I'll never know.

"Well….word spread fast about me and Kari going to the dance together….and well….you know how people are." I said.

"So…you've become an outcast, eh? I know how that feels….last year I went through the same ordeal. Don't worry though. You'll get used to it." He swallowed his food. Yes, he had food in his mouth the whole time he said that. "I actually enjoy it. Makes me feel closer to Ian and H.A."

"You **definitely** don't act it, Dwayne." Ian said, as he started eating. "….how much food did you get anyway?"

"Oh, just three lunches." He responded like it was nothing. I smacked myself in the face.

"Wow….I can barely hold down one serving of this school's food….yet you can somehow handle three." I muttered. Kari was giggling at the whole conversation. "You enjoying our usual conversation?"

"Yes…it's funny to watch you guys ramble on about stuff." She said smiling.

"You know, Kari….I've been confused all day about this." Ian said

"What's that?" She said, still laughing.

"You know how I asked you to the dance, and you turned me down?" I gave an evil glare at Ian at that point. "Well…I just want to know why you took H.A.'s request and not mine."

I kept looking at him. "Ian, man, that was low….you basically just stabbed me in the back right now."

"H.A.'s right, Ian." Kari said. "That was pretty rude to say that right in front of him."

"No offense, seriously. I'm just curious." He said.

"I'm not answering the question Ian." She said stiffly. That made me smile.

"Why not?" I've never seen Ian like this before. He was really trying to push Kari for some reason.

"Because it's my personal business." She said again, very stiffly.

"Come on, now. You just don't want to say you like H.A. or something." He snickered. Now, he was really starting to get on my nerves, too.

"Could you just drop it and live with the fact I turned you down?" Kari had raised her voice. She was really getting mad at him. Ian started laughing.

"Oh…this is hilarious….I bet it's some fetish for guys with two tails or something, right?" That was the last straw for me. It was for Kari as well.

"What was that!?" She yelled, and several students looked over at our table. I stood up.

"Do you mind leaving the table?" I asked. Ian stood up as well, his eyes directly at mine.

"Make me." He said.

"Guys, guys! It's alright! Settle down!" Dwayne said, trying to deal with the situation.

"You want to take this outside?" Ian said smirking at me.

"Gladly." I couldn't have cared less if he was my friend at this point. The way he was acting was seriously out of line.

"Look! Ian and Two-Tail are going to fight!" Someone shouted.

"Really? I thought they were best buds." Some kids were gossiping around already. I sighed and sat back down.

"It's seriously not worth it. You wanna be an ass, Ian? Congratulations, you are one now." I said with a lot of anger in my voice.

"Seriously, it was just one thing. Calm down, man." Ian said sitting down as well. "I was just joking around. I thought you'd think it was funny." That angered me even more.

"Don't give me that!" I said in a raised voice. "You've never **once** said anything about my tails. Good or bad. This is the **first** time you have ever said something about them. Not only that, but now you're trying to cover it up like it was a joke." I stood up and looked at everyone in the cafeteria. My temper had finally set off. "So! Where have I heard that before, huh!? Picking on someone because they were different and then calling it a joke afterward because you went too far?"

No one in the cafeteria said anything. They all sat there, staring at me. I didn't care. I knew tomorrow would be the same as today if I shouted this out or not. A day is basically a year in high school gossip.

"Over-reacting freak…" Someone said under a cough. I took my tray of lunch and tossed it as their face, nailing them dead on.

"Anyone else want a lunch in their face? My friend here has bought a dozen."

"Three." Dwayne interrupted.

"Whatever!" I shouted. Kari was probably the most scared of anyone. She never saw this side of me yet. She didn't even know there was this side of me. In fact, a few minutes ago she got a lecture from me about ignoring the people who make fun of me. I was breaking my own rule.

"H.A….please….this is just too much." Kari said. I took a deep breath.

"…..Yeah...you're right….I'm over-reacting…." I said sitting back down. "Feels good to get that out though.."

Some kid spoke up suddenly. "Thank god his woman was there. I thought that weirdo was gunna kill us."

"That's it." I stood up again. "I'm done." I started to walk out of the cafeteria.

"H.A….." Kari said. I didn't say anything. "H.A.!" She said again louder. I continued walking until I was out of sight. Kari stood up again.

"I hope you're all happy!" She yelled. "Especially you, Ian!" She looked at him angrily and left the cafeteria after me. Everyone just started eating again as if nothing had happened, while Dwayne and Ian were left sitting there just wondering what the hell had happened.

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**There we go. Chapter 3 is over. You'll notice that I tend to jump the time between chapters. Sometimes it'll be a period, or day, or maybe in a month. It's a good way to keep the story going, and not have it take 30 chapters to get through a week of school. :P Now it's time for reviews.**

**Kitsune Disciple: **As you can see, conflict has already begun between H.A. and Ian. Will it continue? We'll find out later. :P

**Hedgehog B. Rebecca: **You're welcome. And I'll definitely let you know when I've decided to let OC characters in.

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	4. Chapter 4

**Yay! Update time. I would have done it earlier, but I had class today. Here's a little more info. on the subject of introducing OCs to the story. After much thought, I've decided it would be a good idea to have "Mini-stories" involving other people's characters to create.....filler, I guess you could say, inbetween major events. Of course, this is still far away. I don't even have an estimate to how many chapters I'm going to have before putting that idea in. Anyways, on with the story!**

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I didn't know why I got so worked up, but I didn't give a damn. I just wanted to get out of that place. Normally I could ignore all that, but Ian made it one-hundred times worse. When I walked past my locker, I punched it as hard as I could, leaving a nice fist-shaped dent in it, which caused my hand to start hurting. I probably bruised it, but that was not my concern right now.

"H.A.! Please stop!" Kari said as she ran toward me. As much as I liked her, I didn't want to talk to anyone at the moment. I opened the doors of the school and left.

The autumn day was very peaceful. There were many people outside appreciating it. How come no one would appreciate me? Was I ever mean to anyone? No. Did I ever do something stupid to make me stand out? No. I'm a nice guy. I like to try and be the best person I could be, and for what? Be shoved aside because I'm different? It should be those kids at school who should be in my place right now. Treating people badly shouldn't give you praise; it should make _you_ the bad guy.

After a few minutes of walking, I ended up at the park a couple blocks from school, and noticed how a few people were giving me looks. I guess adults can be as bad as kids when it comes to accepting someone who's different.

"Mommy….why does that fox have two tails?" Some kid asked their mother. I stopped walking and froze. The mother knew that I had overheard.

"He was probably born that way honey, but it's not nice to point people out because he's different." That made me feel a little better. Too bad things were going to get worse.

"Yo! Freak!" Someone shouted. My ears cringed at the sound of the voice. It sounded like a teen who hadn't just smoked five packs of cigarettes a day, but had also eaten the ends after finishing them. "Nice tails!"

"God…now is not the time to be messing with me, buddy." I said turning around, only to be greeted by a gang of five kids, all foxes. The guy who spoke was a red fox like me, but his fur was ruffled up and was very pale. "Oh…you have friends…great." I said sarcastically. I could tell I was in deep trouble. Upon further observation, I noticed that the kids behind him had weapons in their hands.

"You know….we dun like ya kind around here." He said. My eyes open wide.

"What do you mean, my kind?" I asked.

"My apologies…there ain't a 'Your kind' since you one of a kind, ya freak!" He said and started laughing as everyone else behind him started laughing behind him as well. I noticed that a lot of people in the park were starting to leave. I guess these guys had a reputation of starting up trouble. I would have loved to sock this guy in the face right now, but I couldn't take the risk of being beaten to death. I had to leave, and fast.

"Boss….when do we get to hit him?!" One of his mindless minions asked.

"Shut it! You's all can when I say so!" The leader yelled. He _obviously_ was a great leader.

"What the hell do you want with me anyway?" I asked, realizing that now would be a great time to do "Less talking, more running."

"We here to punish you." He said with a smirk.

"What did I do to get punished? I just met you…wait…I haven't _even_met you. I don't know you and you don't know me." What the hell was I saying!? Why wouldn't I shut up and get out of there!?

He started laughing. "What you do? What in god's name are those things right behind ya?"

"Two tails. Your point? I didn't ask for them." I said, again asking myself why I haven't ran at this point.

"Don't want 'em? That's O.K. I'll slice one off for ya!" His crazy friend yelled as he charged at me with a knife. _Now_ my heart was pounding. I dodged out of the way as fast as I could as the kid fell over, dropping the knife.

"Damn it! Hold still!" He yelled as he reached for the knife. I kicked him in the head before he could grab it, sending him backwards onto the ground. This didn't go over so well with the rest of the group.

"Oh! A fighter! Alright guys, let's make a game of it!" The leader said with a smile. "Whoever's the last one to hit him has to buy drinks for everyone else. Have at it!" As the other three foxes charged at me, I turned around as fast as I could and made a run for it. This was probably the scariest situation I had ever experienced in my life.

As I ran down the streets, I prayed that I'd see some form of police to help me here. Of course, as my luck showed, I got something else.

"H.A.! There you are!" Kari yelled as I ran up to her.

"Kari! Run!" I yelled. She looked at me confused, until she saw the gang of foxes following me. The light switch in her head turned on and she started running as well.

"H.A., what happened?" She asked as she caught up to me.

"I…have….no idea." I said, clearly tired from running already. "I was just…walking around…and they…showed up."

Suddenly, I tripped and stumbled to the ground. I felt a sharp pain go through my ankle in the process. One more point to bad luck. What else could have gone wrong at this point?

"H.A.!" Kari said alarmed as she looked at my ankle. "Are you alright?"

"Get out of here! You don't know what they could do to you." I said. I didn't want to see her get hurt. As the gang of foxes caught up, their leader stepped in front and started laughing.

"Oh! You got a girlfriend, and a cute bitch at that! Perfect! This will be so much better than beating you up!" He said with his cynical and annoying laugh.

"Kari! Forget about me and go!" I demanded.

"You're my friend. I couldn't…" She replied, but she hadn't noticed that two of the foxes snuck behind her and grabbed her arms. Alarmed, she struggled to get free.

"Let me go!" She yelled kicking her legs around.

"Kari!" I said trying to stand up, but I felt that sharp pain in my ankle again and fell to the ground.

"Oh this is priceless!" The leader said, again with a smirk. I really wished someone could shut this guy up. He had to be the most annoying person I had ever seen and I had only known him for like five minutes. "Poor little freak boy can't save his girlfriend."

"Don't call him a freak!" Kari yelled. This felt like school all over again, except these guys were doing more than calling names.

"Boss…she won't stay still!" One fox said.

"I got it…." He said walking up to her. He stared her in the eyes and held out a pocket knife to her neck. "Stop moving, or else."

"No!" She yelled and spit in his face. He didn't take that very kindly.

"Errr….." The fox mumbled wiping his face. He turned back toward her and yelled. "You…bitch!" Then, he smacked her hard across the face. Thank god he didn't use the knife, but this guy was no weakling either. The hit left Kari standing with a few tears falling from her face. I had just about gone over the edge in rage at this point. I stood up and leaned against the nearby wall.

"Put her down! Or else!" I said in a very demanding tone. They all looked at me and laughed. God, I hated being treated like crap.

"Tell ya what." The leader began. "You can have her back after we're done with her." He began to caress Kari's face. I couldn't stand to see this happen right in front of me.

"No! Let her go!" I screamed. The leader stopped to look at how angry I was getting over it. "Do anything you like to me! Fucking kill me for all I care! Just leave her alone!"

The leader smiled at me and actually thought for a bit.

"Boss! He's got a point. Forget screwing this girl! I wanna kick someone's ass!" The same guy I kicked in the head said, cracking his knuckles. He had a giant bruise on his head from where I hit him.

"Yeah! I've been dying to hit something all day!" Another fox said holding up a wooden bat.

"Alright…have at it guys. You can let her go." The leader said as the two foxes dropped Kari. I was relieved to have her out of this, but now I was a goner. The group walked up to me slowly. Suddenly, one of the foxes spoke up.

"Boss, is the bet still on?" He asked. The leader looked at him.

"Bet?"

"Yeah…last guy to hit him, buys a round of drinks." He said. The leader smiled.

"Sure, why not." He snickered a little.

"Let me at him first!" One guy yelled as he pushed forward, but another fox grabbed his leg and pulled him to the ground. Kari noticed that this was a good chance to get away. She ran over to me, held my on her back, and we ran off.

"No way! I get first dibs." Another yelled; all of them kicking and punching.

"Guys!" The leader yelled. "We're a group! We don't need to be fightin' each other." The leader looked around. "Hey….where did he go?"

"I think he got away boss!" A fox yelled.

"Well, don't just stand there!" He yelled, his face now more red than his fur. "Find that freak and kick his ass!"

Kari and I were already a safe distance from them.

"Geeze! You're heavy, H.A.." She said.

"Thanks…I appreciate the compliment." I said sarcastically.

"I think we lost them." She said, setting me down. Afterward, she took closer look at my ankle.

"Please don't tell me it's broken." I said wiping my face. She shook her head.

"No…it's just sprained. It should be fine by the end of the day if you don't put much weight on it." I sighed in relief. The one time I actually wanted to go to the school dance, and it was almost ruined by something stupid.

"Want me to walk you back to your house?" She asked.

"Wait…school isn't over yet." I replied.

"You honestly want to go back there?" She said giggling.

"No thanks." I said with a smirk.

I was almost certain that she liked me the way I liked her. I mean, not only did she stand up for me against the entire school, but she chased after me after I left, and even stood by my side when those goons ambushed me. Still, I was too afraid to ask her. Something in my mind wanted me to wait, just in case. It had only been a day, which was far too soon to get into a relationship.. After a long quiet walk, and also getting lost in the process due to my terrible sense of direction, we reached my house.

"Thanks for helping me get home." I said.

"You're very welcome." She replied.

"Would you like to come inside or something? You probably don't have anything to do today, since we like…..skipped school."

She giggled. "Yeah, I'd love to come in."

When we opened the door and I saw my mother, I knew the world was gunna come crashing down. She had a very surprised look in her eyes, and I bet she wanted to know why I left school so early.

"H.A.!" She shouted. I gulped.

"Y-Yeah..." I asked, expecting the worst.

"I have some news." She started in an immediately calm tone.

"News?" I said confused. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I just got back from the doctor's office today…..and…well…." She paused for a long time. Come on lady! Stop with the suspense already!

"You're going to have another brother or sister!" She said put her hands together with a big smile on her face. My eyes grew huge.

"W-W-W-W-What!!!!???" I shouted in complete shock. Kari hugged me tightly.

"That's so awesome H.A.! Babies are so cute and adorable!" My mouth was hanging so low I was expecting my chin to hit the ground. Then came the question I was expecting.

"Now that that is out of the way H.A.….I'd like to know why you are home so early."

I shook my head to get out of a state of shock, and began to tell my mom about the chaotic day.

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**What a nice way for me to end a chapter, eh? :P Again, if you want to give me permission to use your OCs later on in the story, drop me a PM. (Save the reviews for...well...reviews.) Now for some comments:**

**boredknight: **The contrast and conflict between Ian and H.A. is definitely multi-dimensional. We'll find out later how they resolve their little dispute.

**Sir Chase Vonvit: **You can't ready every chapter everytime, I guess. The same thing happens to me with fanfics I read all the time.

**Hedgehog B. Rebecca: **Thanks, and thanks for the review as well. :D

**kyuubihikari: **Thanks. I try to give my characters their own personalty, without blatantly stating it. That wouldn't be interesting, now would it? :P

**Kitsune Disciple: **Thank's for the tip of using italics over bold. It definitely looks a lot better, and correct as you said. Ian is definitely a tough guy to figure out.


	5. Chapter 5

**'Tis Thursday, which means another chapter for my fellow readers. I don't have anything else to add...so...enjoy the read. :D**

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Well, once I explained myself and the situation, my mother's expression was definitely surprise. It wasn't because I was nearly killed by a gang, or left school early. Nonono, it was a different reason.

"You have a girlfriend!" She shouted happily. Kari and I both cringed at the word "Girlfriend." Both of us started shouting and waving our arms in the air.

"Whoa whoa whoa! Slow down mom! I just met her today. Let's not get carried away here." I didn't notice it, but I was blushing extremely hard.

"Yeah, we're just regular friends." Kari said in a calmer tone than my own, hardly without embarrassment either. My mother gave us both a look.

"Uh huh….sure…." She smiled. I sighed and changed the subject. It was my turn to ask a question.

"Mom….care to explain the whole…baby thing?" I asked. I was simply not expecting something like this to happen, ever. Was my mom seeing someone new without me knowing? I hoped so because if it was my dad, I would have been pretty pissed off.

"Well…I ran into your father a couple weeks ago." Of course it was him. "We talked for awhile, and I really noticed a difference in him. He seemed calmer, and less ill-tempered."

"That's because I wasn't around to up his temper." I rolled my eyes. Kari looked at me confused.

"H.A….please." My mom scolded. "Anyways, we spent the next night out-"

"Wait, I thought you had a late meeting a couple weeks ago." I interrupted.

"H.A…don't interrupt." She said to me in the same tone. "So, after a nice dinner, he invited me over to his place where the magic started to happen." I closed my ears, not wanting to hear anymore.

"And you're never going to see him again, right?" I asked

"He's coming over for dinner tonight." My mom said. Not what I wanted to hear.

"Mom, please….it's going to be a disaster." I whined. "You know dad and I don't get along."

"H.A. I do not care how much you dislike him." My mom scolded at me. "I love him, and that is what matters. He's coming over whether you want him to or not."

I sighed. At least it couldn't be worse.

"Excuse me." Kari asked. "Miss….um…."

"Just call me Heather, Kari." My mom interrupted. "There's no need to be so formal."

"Oh…um…do you mind me staying for dinner?" Kari asked. I cringed at that statement. Kari did _not _want to meet my father.

"Not at all Kari." My mother said. "You're our guest."

"Thanks." She said with a smile. I put my hand on my face. That dinner was going to fall apart, very fast.

With everything cleared up between me and mom, Kari and I headed to my room, which was a mess of course.

"You're so…organized H.A." She said giggling.

"Ha ha ha…I'm not big on cleaning up after myself. I wasn't expected company either." I said, then Kari noticed something.

"H.A….how long have you been able to walk on your ankle?" She asked.

"Well…I…just now?" I lied with a smile that gave it away. Kari tapped her foot for the truth.

"Alright, alright…I was able to put weight on it on the way back to my house." I said putting my hands up. "Is it that big of a deal?"

"Having _me_ bring you home? Oh I see what it is." Kari said giggling. "That's cute." I looked at her a bit worried.

"What are you talking about?" I said with a fake laugh. I was a bit afraid that she might have noticed that I had feelings for her.

"The messy room, and me basically carrying you home. You're just a lazy fox." She said pushing me on my bed playfully, and laughed in the process.

"Oh, is that so?" I commented, but felt relieved inside. "Well, this lazy fox isn't too lazy to fight back." I stood up, grabbed her, and threw her on the bed. I enjoyed my own laugh, before she grabbed me.

"What's the big idea?" She asked me, looking directly at my face. "I could have gotten hurt."

"Don't give me that. You did the same to me." I smirked. She rolled her eyes. Suddenly, I heard the front door open. My heart stopped, thinking it was my father. I then heard my little brother's voice.

"Who was that?" Kari asked, standing up.

"That's my little brother, Shawn…he's a demon child." I said, ironic since my dad called _me_ the demon child. My comment made Kari laugh.

"Come on…he's just a kid. He can't be that bad." She said as she stood up. "I want to meet him."

"Sure…whatever, you go ahead." I said, but Kari tugged my arm and forced me out to the living room.

We headed out toward the living room. Shawn's voice was easily heard as he was very excited to her the news about my dad coming home, and the baby as well.

"Dad's coming over! That's awesome!" Shawn said excitedly to mom. I rolled my eyes. Suddenly, he turned to me.

"H.A.! How come you ditched school? Everyone at school was talking about you leaving." He asked.

"Long story. Don't tend to tell someone like you." I said in a bossy manner.

"H.A…be nice to your brother." My mom said in her own bossy manner. "Why don't you show Shawn your girlfriend?"

"She's not my-"

"Ooooooh! H.A. has a girlfriend! H.A. has a girlfriend!" Shawn teased at me. I was ready to beat the living crap out of him, but with Kari around, and of course, my mother, I could not do such a thing. Kari, on the other hand, just laughed.

"He's really cute." She said, kneeling to be at his height. "How old are you, Shawn?"

"I'm 12…why?" He asked. "You don't have a thing for little boys, do you?" I swear to god, I was gunna kill that kid one day.

"No, I just wanted to know how old you are." She said, a bit confused at his response.

"Well, now you know. What about you, girl?" He said, sticking his tongue at her.

"The name is Kari, actually, and I'm 16." She said, actually getting annoyed at his attitude.

"H.A…" Shawn said, completely ignoring her response. "How come you're dating a hedgehog instead of a fox? That's just stupid."

I almost lost it. "Shawn…I swear to god…will you just shut the f-"

"H.A.! I will not tolerate _that _word in this house!" My mom shouted. "And Shawn…please be a little nicer to our guest."

"Yes ma'am…" Shawn said as Kari stood up.

"What an annoying brat." She whispered into my ear. I smirked.

"So, when is dad supposed to be coming?" Shawn eagerly asked, a question I did not want to know the answer to.

"Be patient, Shawn." My mom ordered. "He should be home in a couple hours."

"H.A…you wanna go for a walk or something?" Kari asked me, quiet enough so that my brother or mother couldn't hear. "I feel a bit uncomfortable here, no offence."

"None taken, I feel uncomfortable, and I live here." I responded. "A walk would be nice."

Kari and I both headed for the door, before my mom stopped us.

"Where are you two going?" She asked.

"We're just going on a walk to pass time." I answered.

"Oh…be sure to be back before dinner." She said.

"Really? You're not going to go out of your way to stop me after I ditched school or anything?" I said, really confused at her response.

"I just don't want to get in the way of you and your girlfriend." She said with a smile. I sighed.

"Sure…whatever…we'll be back later, alright?" I said opening the door.

"Have fun you two." My mom said.

"Yeah! Have fun K-I-S-S-I-N-G." Shawn said giggling. I shook a fist at him before leaving.

"Man! I am so glad to be out of there." I said closing the door. Kari nodded at me.

"So, H.A…what is this whole thing with your dad? Did he beat you as a kid or something?" Kari asked me. I let out a loud sigh.

"It's a very long story…and of course like everything else…has to do with my tails. I don't want to talk about it." I said.

"Come on…I wanna know." She said.

"I really don't want to." I said again.

"Come on." She said, elbowing me jokingly.

"The answer is no." I said with a serious tone.

"Come on!" She said again, jokingly. She was having fun with this. I, however, was not.

"I said no already!" I yelled at her. "I don't want to talk about it! Can you please just drop it!"

It was silent for awhile.

"S-Sorry…" She finally said.

"You should be…" I said looking away. It was a silent for a few minutes, but I turned back to her.

"Look, I shouldn't have yelled..." I said quietly.

"It's fine. I shouldn't have pushed you." Kari said.

"No. It's not. You're my friend...and it's wrong for friends to-" I was quickly cut off.

"Alright, drama-boy. Enough with the cheesy speech." Kari said sticking her tongue at me. I smiled.

"Whatever." I said back.

"What do you wanna do till dinner anyway?" Kari asked.

"How about we ditch it." I said. "I haven't seen my father in a few years, I don't plan to any time soon."

"H.A…be serious…" She said.

"I am being serious." I said back. "I. Do not. Want. To see. My dad." I said slowly and clearly.

"Come on." Kari said. "You're constantly complaining about him, and yet you don't want to tell me why." She grabbed my arm. "It's like you want to tell me, but you don't at the same time."

"The man is evil, Kari…let's leave it at that." I said, trying to pull my arm back, but she wouldn't give.

"Your mother seems pretty happy to have him over." She said. "He can't be that bad."

"My mom doesn't give two shits about me when he's around." I said finally getting my arm back, and started walking away.

"H.A! Come on!" Kari said going after me. "You're overreacting." I stopped walking.

"I'm not overreacting…" I mumbled.

"Is it really that much of a problem to tell me? We're friends. We should be able to talk to each other about stuff." She said. I don't know why, but something told me that I had to tell her. I took a deep breath.

"Alright…you really want to know why?" I said, still not facing her. She nodded.

"O.K…" I let out a big sigh.

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**So, already you know that the next chapter is going to be a flashback.....I guess there's nothing else to say except, next chapter will be up Monday.**

**Hedgehog B. Rebecca**: As I've said, I don't even have a set date for the additions of OCs yet. Since I never thought about implementing them, they will come later in the story after what I've wanted to say has been said.

**Kitsune Disciple:** Thanks. Originally I wasn't planning on having H.A. get in trouble with a gang till later but...hey it worked here. :P I was also debating on the new sibling thing, but a certain idea popped in my head that will definitely add a twist to the story when he/she is born. Read close for clues on what it could be. ;)

**Sir Chase Vonvit: **I hope this chapter answered your question. Thanks for the review.

**kyuubihikari:** Thanks, and thanks for reading.


	6. Chapter 6

**Next Thursday is probably going to be the last Thursday update since we're quickly catching up to how many chapters I have already written. Also, I have to say it's probably a rough estimate of 10-15 chapters before considering OCs. That's probably where the part of story is going to need some filler to get to the next big story event. :P Since I've said my two cents, I'd like to thank everyone who has been reading. I wouldn't be doing this without the reader in mind. Now, let's get back on with the story. Flashback away!

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My parents were a very happy couple in the years back. They were just like any other young couple; new to marriage, happy to have each other for the rest of their lives, and had so much planned for the future. One thing they didn't plan on was me. The news of my mom being pregnant was a complete shock. Of course, after the initial shock, came the happiness of having a child in their lives.

My father at first glance looked like a successful man; nice clothes, a nice house, and the new marriage to my mom. The reality was he had a dead-end job, and had only recently bought a house, with a huge loan of course. All I know is that our family was in a lower-middle class society. My dad was apparently a nice guy with a great personality and great looks. Hell, why else would my mom fall for him back then?

It was only a short nine months before I came into this world, and my family would change forever. For some odd reason, my parents decided to have me delivered at home. The same was done for Shawn, and I'm assuming it's some sort of tradition that I don't know about. Anyways, when I was born, the first thing that my father noticed, before even knowing my gender, was my two tails. This is where the story I was told gets fuzzy. My mom doesn't remember the exact words or details of what he said amongst his yelling, but I recall something about my father attempting to slam my face into a wall, and I'm probably lucky to be alive if my mom had not stolen me from my dad at that moment.

"Hector, please!" She yelled. "This isn't like you! It's only an extra tail!"

"You're right." He said with a calmer voice. "We could easily remove it."

"Never!" My mom gasped, holding me closer for worthless protection. "He's our son, and we will love him for who he is."

"I'd rather worship the devil himself, than take care of that…thing!" My father shouted. My mother started to cry, and I started to cry as well.

"H-Honey…please…" She begged with tears running down her face. "Why not? He's your son. He's your flesh and blood!"

My father didn't respond to her pleading or questions. Only a few minutes had passed since my birth, and my household was already a wreck. Some miracle of birth I was. My father opened the front door, and was just about to leave before my mom stopped him.

"You are going nowhere, Hector!" She shouted as she grabbed his arm. "Whether you want to or not, you are going to _love_ this child! Give him a chance! He doesn't even have a name!" My mom's demands broke my dad's bit of patience.

"A name? How about 'Hell's Abomination?' Fits him just fine." He ripped his arm from hers. "You couldn't get me to love that thing."

"By hating him, you hate yourself!" She shouted back at him, trying to make some sense in her words. "You created him. He's your son!" She repeated the last sentence over and over, until my dad finally snapped.

"Shut up already!!!" He yelled, slapping my mother across her face. The entire room went silent besides my crying. My father walked out the door and slammed it closed.

My mother's nose was now bleeding, so she grabbed a tissue and wiped it. She then went on to hug me close, trying to calm me down.

"Shhhh…it'll be alright." She said softly into my ear. "He's gone…" She paused. "He's gone…oh God, he's actually gone!" She burst into tears once again, but I stopped crying. I had no reason to cry, even if I was an infant. It was my mother's turn to cry now.

A few minutes later, my mother had finally calmed down. "You know what?" She said to me while wiping her face off with a tissue. "I'm glad he's gone. You'll be much more a man than he'll ever be." One would think my mom was crazy. I mean, she was talking to an infant for crying out loud! It's better than talking to a wall, I guess.

"You still need a name, and my husband's idea for your name just won't do." She smiled. "Why not just make it H.A.? Do you like that?" She asked, knowing I couldn't possibly respond. "H.A. it is then." She said happily. Now that I look back at it, that was probably the stupidest name she could have given me. The initials of the name my dad gave me? Why didn't she just put a big sticker on her head saying "I agree with what my husband was saying about my son" or something?

Four years later would be the next time I would ever see my father, and I wished it was my last time. He walked into the house without knocking, and my mother noticed him as soon as he walked in. They both stared at each other for what seemed for an eternity, until I came running around the corner to see my mom. My father immediately stared at me. When I saw him, it scared me to see him staring at me like that.

"M-Mommy….why is that guy looking at me?" I asked, as a sudden fear built inside me.

"It's nothing, H.A. Go and play now, O.K.?" She replied. I nodded and ran off.

"So….you named it H.A.?" He said walking closer to her. With every step he took, she took one back.

"Don't call him 'It' You don't deserve to be his father anymore."

"Good." He smiled.

"Why are you here, anyway?" My mother asked.

"No reason, it's my house after all, right?" He said walking around the living room. "I just missed the place a little. Of course…." He turned back to my mom. "I missed you much more." He went in to kiss my mother, and for some reason, she accepted.

"Oh…honey…why can't you just pretend to love him at least? We could still be a family." She asked, and if I was there to hear that, I would have been disgusted with her for asking it.

"We've been over this before. Four years ago to be exact." He said holding her close.

"He needs a father." My mother said, contradicting her own statement that was said only a minute ago. I could overhear them talking now, and hid far away to watch. I didn't know who the guy was at the time and he was kissing my mother and holding her close.

"Give him a chance." She continued. "He's a very good boy. He never acts up, has any tempers, or anything. He's a lot like you…well, what you _used_ to be." She pushed him away after that statement, and he didn't take it very lightly.

"I couldn't give a damn if it was the king of Mobius. That freak would make me look like a laughing stock if people knew I was its father!" He yelled. I looked at my tails. I always knew I was different for having two tails, but my father made it seem like people would hate me for it. It was at this time, I ran out crying to my mom. I bolted toward her as fast as I could when the tears started to escape.

"Mommy….am I a freak?" I said crying into her chest.

"Nonono honey….you're just different. In fact…." She stared into my dad's eyes. "You're _better_ than everyone else." She looked back at me. "Having two tails is a gift you should cherish…O.K.?" She wiped my face and I gave a slight nod. "Now, run along. Dinner should be ready soon."

"Don't feed it lies." My dad said, grabbing my arm forcefully before I could run away. "I want it to sit and watch our conversation. It needs to see what damage it has caused our family."

"W-What did I do?" I asked, really scared.

"I'm your dad, kid." He said.

"Then why are you being so mean?" I asked. "Mommy told me that daddy was nice."

"You're a freak, that's why." He said boldly.

"Hector!" My mom shouted.

"I'm.....I'm a freak?" I said, repeating his words. My eyes started to tear up a little.

"Go outside, Heather." My dad commanded. "H.A. and I need to bond."

"I'm not leaving this room until you're out of here." She replied. My dad grabbed her wrist and pushed her toward the door, making her back bang against it.

"Leave." He said again. I looked at my mom, thinking I was going to die if she left the house. To my dismay, she put her head down, opened the door, and obeyed my father's command.

"Why did you do that! You hurt mommy!" I yelled, pounding my little fist on him. He grabbed me and picked me up, so we could make eye contact.

"Listen here you little....thing." My dad said. "My life was perfect before you came around. You ruined everything for me with your freakish tails!"

"Mommy told me you did this to yourself." I said looking away from him, crossing my arms. The vein in his head started to pop out, and his voice rose once again.

"Errr....you little brat! Shut your damn mouth!" He said, literally throwing me into the couch in the living room. Thankfully, the cushion stopped the fall, but at four years old, it still hurt a lot. "You've got nothing to blame but those tails." That was the last thing he said before walking outside, leaving me crying.

"What did you do to him!?" My mom demanded an answer.

"I did nothing to him." He lied. "He's still a brat from hell."

"So....you're done calling him an 'It?'" My mom asked.

He said nothing in response. All he did was roll his eyes. "How about we try to catch up on things? Just the two of us." He asked my mom.

"What about H.A.?" She asked.

"We'll get him a baby-sitter." He said.

"Well….alright." My mom said carefully. "I'll admit….I did miss you, too."

With that, my parents got back together, but still lived separately. My mom then told me everything that happened between them. While I tried to embrace the fact I had a dad now, my father would still treat me like shit. The worst part was my mother would always be behind him all the time whenever he acted up toward me.

Shawn was born a year after that, and I noticed something very different my father's behavior. He would always play with Shawn, and leave me out of the picture. He would always use my tails as a scape-goat for his own problems. I used to always curse my two tails, and even attempted to cut one of them off when I was 10. Thankfully, my mom caught me before I even attempted to do anything, and then gave me the whole "Two tails is a gift" speech again.

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"I've eventually learned to accept the fact that I'm different, but I still always lose it every once in awhile. Kinda like at school today…" I turned back to Kari. "So…that's about it."

"That's…so sad…" She said looking at the ground, shuffling her feet. "You know…we could still ditch your family's dinner if you want."

"That would be very nice, but…I don't think I would actually go through with it. My mom would kill me." I said. Kari laughed.

"Well, that settles it then. It's almost time to eat anyway." She said, and we headed back to my house.

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**Lot's of information jammed into this chapter. As I said before, this coming Thursday will be the last Thursday update. After that, you'll have to wait a whole week before an update. :P I probably could have put more detail into this chapter, but as said in Hamlet, "Less words, more art." Now for some comments.**

**cloveria1215:** I never got the PM. I think the inbox might be messed up on the site. You could try re-sending it.

**Sir Chase Vonvit: **You were pretty much on the money with your guess. :P

**Kitsune Disciple: **Thanks for the review. Clues about the baby will appear in many chapters, but the actual birth isn't going to take place for some time. (I've already taken 6 chapters up on one day, and it's a whole 9 months before the baby is born. O_O)

**Hedgehog B. Rebecca:** Don't worry, you didn't tick me off in the slightess. ^^ Thanks for the review though.


	7. Chapter 7

**It's Thursday again, and that means a new chapter. Yay! :D Unfortunately, this will be the last Thursday update. We've just about caught up to where I left off on the forums this was posted in. Waiting a week for a chapter isn't that bad, is it? :P Now, on with the chapter.**

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I would have paid someone money to make the walk back to my house take longer. I haven't seen my father in years, and I wanted to keep it that way. Unfortunately, fate can be a bitch. It always seemed to grab me by the neck with both hands, and shake me violently until I stopped breathing. I started to wonder how the night would go with my dad. The last time I saw him was when I was twelve; just a small kid who still didn't understand why he was being picked on his whole life. Now, I was a full grown teenager. I viewed things with a different perspective, and understood my "Gifted Curse" with a developed mind. I could even argue with my dad, rather than being yelled at the whole time like I was a baby who couldn't talk. A grin grew across my face with the thought of talking back to my dad. Maybe this night wouldn't be so bad after all; taking all the years of holding back my anger and throwing them right back in my dad's face.

Two blocks till we would be back at the comforting hell that was my house. After thinking of things to say to my dad, I ran into a problem. Kari was going to be at the table. I may have told her about my past, but this was the real deal. How would she feel when she sees me screaming at my father will pure hatred in my eyes? There's no way she would look at me the same way again. Things have been going so well between us in only a day, and to screw it all up to get back at my father would be the most idiotic thing I would ever do in my life. Still, she didn't mind my blow-up back at school, and my temper from that was because of simple words, whereas this was years of repression; and yet, I felt like arguing with my dad would be the wrong thing to do.

Only a block left now. Kari grabbed my hand. It surprised me, but I didn't mind it as I looked over at her. Damn, she was beautiful. Her dark blue hair, the red headband she wore that matched the color of my fur; her favorite color I hoped, and her sky-blue eyes. I really wanted to tell her my feelings, but I just couldn't. '_It was too soon'_ I repeated over and over in my mind. As I've said before, we've only known each other for a day, and for most people, that was only enough time to become an acquaintance. However, Kari and I had become good friends. We went through a lot that day; more than most people would go through in their entire high school life.

"H.A……you're squeezing my hand." She said slowly, as if she wasn't trying to interrupt my deep thoughts. My cheeks turned slightly red. I hadn't realized it, but I had begun to sweat. I quickly took my hand away from hers and looked away.

"Oh!" I replied suddenly. "Sorry… I'm just a little worried about how the night is going to go." That would have been a lie, but my house soon came in plain sight. Now, I actually _was _worried. After much thought, I decided I wasn't going to do anything crazy toward my dad. He was going to come and yell about how terrible I was, I would sit there completely ignoring his remarks, he would leave, and then it would be over. I played the scenario over and over again in my head, until we reached the front door. Before opening it, I checked the driveway for my dad's car; it wasn't in sight. I let out a small sigh of relief and slowly opened the door. It always seemed that the less you want to be heard, the door does the opposite. I'm surprised the door didn't scream "Hey everybody! H.A. is home!" when I opened it. Surely enough, my mother heard me and Kari come in.

"There you two are." She said with a smile. She was really excited to have my dad come over for dinner. What she saw in that bastard anymore was beyond me. "Dinner should be ready in about twenty minutes. How was your walk?"

"Enjoyable. It's a nice day, isn't it Kari?" I said with a fake smile.

"Oh yes. The sunset is beautiful. You guys get a much better view of it here than at my house." She said playing along with me. If my mom knew that I was originally planning on ditching dinner, she wouldn't let me leave my room till I was out of high school.

"That's nice to hear." My mom said walking back into the kitchen. The smell coming from it made me glad I didn't skip dinner. I was hungry, and my mom's cooking was _very_ good.

"What are we having?" I asked without even realizing I had said it. The smell left me ever so curious.

"Nothing special, just spaghetti and meatballs." My mother replied.

"I don't eat much Italian food." Kari said. "Is it good?"

"You haven't lived till you've had my cooking." My mom said with a grin.

I had to interrupt. "Yes, yes. That's very nice and all, but Kari and I need to get ready for din-"

"I cook a little bit myself. Do you mind letting me help?" Kari asked, interrupting me.

"No problem, dear. Just come into the kitchen with me and I'll show you a few pointers." My mom said, adding her own little flare to her voice. I put my hand on my face. It looked like I was stuck doing nothing till dinner. Not unusual to say the least, but I wanted to chat with Kari before my dad arrived.

It was only a few minutes later that my father's car parked into the driveway. I heard the car door slam closed, and with that, my heart started to beat faster. I felt like going to my room until dinner started, but I decided against it. I wanted the first person my dad to see was me. So, I leaned against the wall in the living room until he came inside.

What I saw when the door opened didn't surprise me. He looked the same as he did the last time I met him. It always felt like my dad never aged, at least in my eyes anyway. Still, something did look different about him in size. Since I grew a lot in the years, I was actually a half foot taller than him, and more built to add on to the comparison. Long story short, if there was a fight between me and my dad, you'd be safe placing all your money on me to kick his ass.

I purposely had my tails sit in front of me, so that they could be in plain sight for my father to see. He gave me a quick glance, but then walked into the kitchen. I never took my eyes off of him. Doing so would make me feel insecure and I didn't want him to think that. Kari had already left the kitchen before he had entered. Somehow, she came out of my bedroom.

"When did you leave the kitchen?" I asked, a little confused about her whereabouts.

"Your mom was already finished with everything, and I thought you were in your room already." She replied. "Is your dad here yet?"

"He's in the kitchen." I said sternly back to her. Kari didn't say anything for awhile after that. She looked me in the eyes again. It was like she was trying to communicate with me telepathically.

"So…..did you two talk to each other?" She asked.

"Nope." I said sternly yet again.

"Did he even look at you?" She asked yet another question.

"A glance, but that was all." I said still leaning against the wall.

"Why didn't you talk to him?"

"Well, I wanted him to speak first."

"You expected him to talk first? After what you've told me, I would be surprised if he did that."

"I would have talked first, but I didn't know what to say."

"Well….you'll have all of dinner time to talk to him." That was the last thing she said before my mother called use in for dinner. I lifted myself off the wall and walked into the dining room. My dad was already sitting down, waiting for his food to be served to him.

"Look at him. Treating my mom like a slave. He's just sitting there waiting for his food." I said to Kari with a big of anger in my voice.

"We're all doing the same thing, H.A." Kari said with a little chuckle. "You just need to chill out a little, O.K.?" I let out sigh.

"Let's get this over with." I said, taking the further seat from my dad; Kari sat next to me. My mother and Shawn sat at the other end of the table, leaving my father to keep his one side by himself.

The dinner started off completely silent, but I noticed my dad looking over at Kari every chance he could get; even after every bite of food. It wasn't long before he spoke those words I wish he would never ask.

"Who is that girl sitting by him?" I almost chuckled at him not saying my name. My mom tried to answer.

"That's H.A.'s-"

"That's H.A.'s girlfriend!" Shawn blabbed out. My father almost immediately spit out his food. The dinner table became silent once again, until he started laughing hysterically.

"Oh….that was a good one, Shawn. _Him_ having a girlfriend? Man, I'd be seeing meteors falling out of the sky right now if that were true." I looked over at my mom who said nothing. My head shook in disgust at her not sticking up for me, but then Kari spoke.

"Oh...is that so?" She said. I looked at Kari, wishing she didn't speak up.

"What is your name, miss?" My dad said, still with a grin at Shawn's remark.

"Kari." She said, still looking at my dad with concern.

"That's a nice name…..now…who are you really?" He asked again.

"I'm H.A's friend, and I'm not to happy with you treating him like this." She said.

"Kari...stop...that's not a good idea." I whispered to her.

"Haha! A friend? It's still funny. I just won't believe it." He said with a grin.

"I'm telling you dad! She's H.A.'s girlfriend! It's not a joke!" Shawn interrupted yet again. My dad didn't take that as a joke the second time around.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" He said when he stood up.

"Honey! Please!" My mom said covering Shawn's ears.

"There is no way that……that thing could have a girlfriend! And to make things worse, she's a hedgehog for crying out loud!" He banged the table, and then pointed a finger at me. "I don't know what kind of psycho world you live in, but there's no room for hedge-fox babies in this house. Dating a hedgehog! I guess I shouldn't have expected better of you. I want her out of this house now!"

"No!" I said standing up. "I don't care if you talk trash about me, but leave my friends out of it. What the hell did she do to deserve to be kicked out of this house?"

"It's my house, my rules." He said grinning, thinking he won the argument.

"Fuck you!" I cussed at my dad. "You haven't been here in five years, and as far as I'm concerned, I can have whoever the hell I want here! And F.Y.I., she isn't my girlfriend, she's just a _friend_. O.K.? Can you get that through your thick-headed skull, you bastard? Huh!?" I don't think I've ever been that pissed in my life. Kari looked at me and saw the person she saw back at school the same day. My dad stared me down, but took his seat. He knew he'd been beat. I sighed, and sat back down myself. My mother took her hands off Shawn's ears, and Kari also took a big sigh.

"What just happened?" Shawn asked.

"It was nothing, honey." My mom said. I just looked at her with disgust again. That's a pretty big nothing. "H.A. and daddy are just…..catching up."

"I want to catch up with dad too!" He whined. "I just hope he doesn't start yelling at me, too." My dad chuckled at his comment.

"Don't worry, son." He said, reaching over to ruffle up Shawn's hair. "We can catch up after dinner alright? I'm sorry I haven't been home in awhile." The way he said that made me sick to my stomach. The way everyone was treating the situation like my dad and I didn't even fight made me feel very, very sick.

"May I be excused?" I asked my mom.

"But you've hardly eaten anything." My mom said.

"I've suddenly lost my appetite. Something disgusting must have upset my stomach. Whatever could it have been?" I said with the most sarcasm I could pull off. I could tell my dad was getting angry again, but I was betting inside he was relieved I was leaving the table.

"Alright, alright." My mom said giving in. "But, you better not be eating any midnight snacks, H.A."

"Right, whatever." I said. "I'll see you in a bit Kari, alright?"

"Alright, H.A…" She said, with a worried look on her face. As I left the table, I could hear everyone begin talking again. This time, it was all casual, and there were no awkward, silent moments. Without me at the table, everything was normal.

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**Phew! That was a pretty climatic chapter. I really like looking back at the older chapters, and seeing how much my writing has changed already. My English Professor really helped me kick some pretty bad habits, and my writing is looking much nicer. Now. On to the comments:**

**Cloveria1215: **Still no PM. That's kinda weird how it's not working.

**Kitsune Disciple:** Beating up his dad? I think that was foreshadowed in this chapter. :P Thanks for the review.

**kyuubihikari: **H.A. wouldn't hate him if he wasn't an jerk. Every story needs some sort of evil meniacle character right? :P

**Hedgehog B. Rebecca: **You'll be the first to know when OCs start to get their chance in this story.

**Sir Chase Vonvit: **Yeah, that name was a bit....terrible and expected but I had some trouble thinking of what else H.A. could stand for. :P


	8. Chapter 8

**It's Monday yet again. It's my last day of college which I'm excited about, but it's also the start of one update a week on this. (There's no way I can write 2 chapters a week, even if I'm on vacation. I'm too lazy. :P) Not much else to say, except I want to thank the readers so far. There hasn't been a lot of people reading it, but those who have are continuing to comment after every chapter. I'm grateful for that. :D Now, on to the story.**

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I lied down on my bed. I knew that was going to happen from the moment I learned my dad was coming over. He didn't even know Kari, and yet he wanted her out of the house, solely because I invited her over; what a bastard. I turned my head over to my computer. Music would have definitely helped me cope with the anger, but I didn't feel like getting up; I wanted to lie there till I fell asleep. Kari would go home, and the day would finally end. My door opened, so I sat up to see who was coming in. To no surprise it was Kari, and she had a plate of food with her.

"I brought you some food." She said. "Your mom said it was alright." I lied back down on the bed without saying a word. I wanted to be alone right now. Kari took the hint, but she wasn't going to leave anyway. She put the plate down and sat down next to me.

"I can see why you don't want to talk…" She began. "It was weird though…everything was so casual after you left the table." There were a few minutes of silence. I guess Kari wanted me to respond before she would talk again.

"…Your dad left, by the way." She stated. This made me sit up.

"…Good." I finally spoke. "What time is it anyway?"

"It's only eight." She answered, reading at the clock on my wall, which I mistakenly forgot to look at.

"Do you wanna go home?" I asked. "There's really nothing left to do here."

"Don't try and lie your way of getting me out of here. I know you want me to stay." She smiled.

"Heh…that's true. Company is always nice." I let out a small smile. "So…since you _do_ want to stay here tonight…what do you want to do?"

"I was thinking we could make out…" She said giving me a sexy look. I jumped to my feet.

"W-W-W-What!?" I said in shock. She started laughing hysterically.

"Hahaha! I got you good! You should have seen the look on your face!" She said holding her stomach. I wasn't laughing though. I felt pretty bad actually; the way she toyed with my emotions with a cruel joke. Still, I didn't want her to feel bad, so let out my own fake laugh.

"Oh yeah…heh….I didn't see that coming at all." I looked around my room for something to do, but I didn't know what. "So…what do you really want to do?"

"Make out of course." She said again with a smile. I sighed.

"You can't get me twice with that." I said giving her a smile back.

"I'm being serious this time…." She said coming closer to me, and once again I started to blush heavily.

"K-Kari!?" I stuttered, but then she started to laugh again.

"Oh! I got you again!" She said trying to catch her breath. "It's always so funny to do that to guys." Why was she doing this? Does toying around with me seem like a game to her?

"Damn it Kari! Cut that out!" I yelled, accidentally letting out a little bit of my temper.

"Easy H.A…it was just a joke." She said, trying to calm me down a little. I sighed again.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah….whatever. Can we talk about something else now?" I asked, still a bit frustrated by Kari's little joke.

"I mean, I don't know why you would get so worked up over it." She said, thinking out loud.

"Can we please discuss something else?" I said a little louder, as I really wanted the subject to change.

"It's not like you _like-like_ me or anything." She said. My mouth was glued shut after she said that. There was a long pause. "……Do you actually…like me, H.A.?"

I quickly thought of something. "Well, yeah….since you are my friend and all." I said, trying to get out of the situation. I was sweating pretty badly.

"No…I mean really _like_ me." Kari asked again, really putting emphasis on the word like. "Well…do you, H.A.?"

I didn't want to answer that question. If I said no, I'd be lying, and we might not ever get into a relationship later on. If I said yes, and she didn't like me back, our friendship would've been smashed into a million pieces. Fortunately, my door opened in the middle of the silence.

"H.A., have you eaten any of the food Kari brought you?" My mom asked stepping in.

"Oh…uh…not yet. I'll eat some now. Thanks." I said grabbing the plate as my mom shut the door. I prayed that Kari would skip the subject as I took a bite of the food.

"So…how is it?" Kari asked smiling.

"It's my mom's cooking. I know how it tastes." I said after swallowing. "It's great, of course." I was so relieved that the subject changed. "So…did my mom say when she was expecting to see my dad again?"

"Nope." Kari said. "And I hope to God that guy never comes back. He's just so…ug! I can't stand him!" I let out a chuckle.

"Well, knowing my mom, she won't see him again till the baby is born." I said grabbing another bite. It was easy to tell I was starving. "I still can't believe it though. Another sibling?"

"I just hope it's a girl. You guys don't need another Shawn around here." Kari said.

I started laughing. "Oh yes! I would die if it was Shawn all over again."

"Or…" Kari began. "Maybe he'll end up like you."

"Like me?" I said looking at my tails. "I don't think he'll have two tails, Kari."

"No. I mean you have a great personality, and from what you told me, you weren't a bad little kid either." She explained.

"Thanks for the compliment." I said, but a certain thought left me curious. "You know…you've never told me anything about your family at all. We've only been talking about me so far. I want to know more about you." I pointed at her with my fork before eating a bit more.

"Well….uh….there's not much to say…." She began.

"Come on. Everyone says that about their family. 'My family is so dull and boring, and you have the greatest family on earth.'" I said in a humorous way while putting my empty plate down. She hit me in the arm.

"Alright, alright." She said. "Well…let's see….my family moves….a lot. I think I've been to a different school every year since I was in 6th grade. It made it really hard to make friends, but oh man, did boys ask me out a lot. They really must have wanted to date the new girl or something." She laughed. I laughed too, but I was left curious.

"Did you ever accept any dates?" I asked. She nodded.

"Oh, lots of times. However, I've only had one real boyfriend." I listened closer. "He was from the last school I went to. His name was Daniel, and he was such a nice guy. He would always buy me stuff all the time, and tell me how much he loved me all the time, and all sorts of other stuff." She sighed just thinking about him. I wanted to gag myself after listening to how great this guy was.

"It was the weirdest thing when I told him I was moving." She said. "He wasn't upset or anything." She paused. "I mean, there I was; standing there breaking down in front from him, and he didn't look like he cared at all."

"That's just messed up." I commented.

"It gets worse." Kari continued. At this time, I noticed that her eyes were starting to tear up a little bit. "When I turned around to leave, I heard another girl speak to him. 'Is that the girl you used to date?' She said. So I turned back to him again. 'Umm…I still date him you know!' I said to her. But then Dan said, 'Actually…..I heard you were moving yesterday and well…I didn't think things were working out anyways. You understand, right?'" Kari wiped her face.

"What an asshole!" I said. "Did you at least hit him or something?"

Kari shook her head. "I started yelling at him uncontrollably. His only response was, 'Well, what do you want me to do? Dump the girl I just starting dating for you again? You're moving, and you're not even as pretty as her! What would be the point?'" At this time, Kari started cry. I didn't know what to do. I've never had to deal with a girl breaking down in front of me before, but I had to say something.

"You're telling me that guy tossed you aside like nothing because you were moving? What a loser!" I ranted. "Has that guy not heard of a long distance relationship or something? People have them all the time and they work just fine. Kari, I promise to give this guy a nice whack in the head if I ever get the chance to meet him, alright?" She stopped crying sometime in the middle of my angry ranting, and let out a little laugh at my last comment.

"Thanks, H.A." She said wiping her face again.

"It's nothing, really." I said. "Ian basically did that to his last girlfriend, and let me tell you, I was not happy with him. I can't stand it when guys take advantage of girls like that."

Right after I said that, Kari gave me a hug, and I was completely caught off guard by it. I won't lie; I've never had a girl hug me before besides my own mother. It felt…..really good. It became really quiet all of a sudden, and I had to say something to break the silence.

"So…..how about that dance Friday?" I asked as she let go of me. "I bet it'll be a lot of fun….wow, you know I've never associated fun with my school before." This made Kari laugh again.

"Oh yeah, it will definitely be lots of fun." She said.

"Glad to know you're feeling better." I said. "Sorry I pulled that out of you."

"I was bound to talk to someone about it eventually." She said. "Better you than someone like Ian. No offense, since he's your best friend, but what was his problem today?"

"Your guess is as good as mine." I said shrugging. "Today was really the first time we've ever had an argument…well…a real argument anyway." I paused. "Hmm…knowing him, he'll be kissing up to me tomorrow."

"Better make him kiss your feet and be a life slave before I'll ever talk to him again." Kari said rolling her eyes.

"Hey, hey. That's a bit harsh." I commented with a smile. I looked at my clock. "Ten thirty already?"

"The night is still young." Kari said looking at me the way she did before when she was joking earlier.

"Oh, God. Not this again." I said putting my hand on my head. This made Kari laugh.

"Don't worry. I'm not cruel enough to pull that on you three times." She said as her cell phone suddenly started to ring. She looked at the ID and gasped.

"Crap! It's my parents!" She said with fear. "I never told them I was coming over here. I'll never hear the end of it if I tell them I'm over at some guy's house who I just met."

"Oh! I have an idea!" I shouted with a smile. "Tell them I'm your new boyfriend. That'll keep them quiet." I think my heart and brain were having a war inside of me after I said that. Kari nodded with a smile.

"Great idea. I'll be back in a minute." She said getting up after answering her call. I lied back down on my bed for the one-hundredth time. This time I was actually tired, so I shut my eyes. I drifted off to sleep before Kari came back into the room. As she walked in, she noticed me on the bed.

"He's really cute in his sleep." She said to herself as she walked closer to me. "Good night, H.A." She walked back out of my room, and rested herself on the couch in the living room. One day of school down, one-hundred seventy-nine to go.

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**Good lord! That chapter was 100% dialogue. At least we get to know a little bit of Kari's past. :P Now on to comments:**

**Cloveria1215: **I got your PM.

**Hedgehog B. Rebecca: **I've never been creative with names, so I'm betting many people could have thought of something better. :P

**kyuubihikari: **Thanks. I try hard even if I'm lazy.

**Sir Chase Vonvit: **Yup, I'm terrible with names. :P Thanks, BTW.

**Kitsune Disciple: **The tension has subsided for the time being as you can see. It's too early in the story for a family tornado to unfold. :P


	9. Chapter 9

**Wow. So much stuff has happened to me this summer, it's not even funny. I also cannot believe how quickly the time is just flying by. Two months since my last update? Impossible! It feels like two weeks. With that said, I would like to apologize for not updating in such a long time. One thing lead to another and well, time just slipped away. I guess to make it up to you guys, this chapter is extra long. I'm hoping to get the one chapter a week thing going again, updating every Monday. We'll see if that works out, and if it doesn't, I'll try something different. Enjoy your very very delayed chapter!

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**

The next morning was much different than the previous day. I didn't recall the dream I had, but I was not woken up to the screaming sound of my mom's voice. I actually woke up on my own. I sat up in my bed stretching; glancing over at the clock.

"Damn, seven?" I said with a yawn. "For a second there I thought I overslept." There was a knock on my door.

"H.A., are you awake yet?" My mom asked, intruding my room.

"….Yeah…" I replied in a barely audible tone. "Where's Kari?"

"She's in the kitchen helping me make breakfast. That's some girl you picked up." She said with a smile. I just sighed.

"Uh huh….whatever." I gave up on correcting people about me and Kari. Once I exited my room, I could already smell the food from the kitchen. I was planning on taking a shower before breakfast but, I think my stomach was thinking otherwise.

"Oh, good morning, H.A." She said in a very cheery and perky tone.

"….Hey…." I muttered as I entered the kitchen. My hair was sticking up in a hundred different directions, my eyes were half closed, and my tails just dragged along the floor as I walked. Kari, on the other hand, was already dressed, and looked like she was ready for school already. I shook my head trying to wake myself up a little.

"Mmm…pancakes…" I said sitting down at the table. "Let's hope you can cook as well as you say you do, Kari."

"Hey, that wasn't very nice." She commented.

"It's what you get for last night's little joke." I said back.

"What joke?" My mom asked.

"Nothing." Kari and I both quickly replied. My mom gave us a look, but shrugged and continued making breakfast.

"So, how did your parents take the 'news?'" I asked with a grin.

"Don't get me started!" She said sighing. "After what happened with Daniel, they became so clingy, thinking that I was going to commit suicide from depression or something." She shrugged. "They're definitely over-protective at times. I really wish they weren't."

"And I'm the exact opposite." I said grabbing a pancake as my mom brought them to the table. "You know how my dad is. I bet he would throw a party if I was dead or something."

"H.A....please." My mom said. Shawn suddenly came walking in like a zombie.

"I'm tired....." He said rubbing his eyes and yawning.

"Would you like some breakfast, Shawn?" My mom asked. He just shook his head, plopped himself on the couch, and fell back to sleep. My mom got up to go wake him up as I chuckled. I wasn't one to talk; I was half asleep myself.

"You still didn't tell me what your parents thought." I said pointing at Kari. "Did ya tell them that I had two tails? I'm charming? I'm a crazy maniac? What happened?" I was very eager to know what went down.

"Easy H.A." She said. "All I told them was that I was staying at a friend's house. At first they wanted me to come home immediately but once I mentioned the word 'Boyfriend' it didn't take them long to change their mind." She laughed.

"That would do it." I said, even though I still thought I was an idiot for thinking up the idea.

"The thing with Ian yesterday still pisses me off." Kari said changing the subject.

"He goes on my bus." I said. "You can return the favor anyway you like." I paused. "Well…keep the violence down."

"Oh, am I some sort of killer?" She said. I grinned.

"Maybe." She yanked on my ear.

"Still think so?" She questioned, pulling my ear harder.

"Ow! Ow! O.K.! Uncle! Uncle!" I yelled as she let go. I rubbed my ear. "Geeze…way to prove my point." She gave me a deathly stare.

"Alright, alright. Jokes aside, what _are_ ya gunna say?" I asked.

"Well, first I want him to apologize to both you and me." She began. "I'm sure you have something to ask him yourself. You said he's never acted like that before." I shrugged.

"Eh, a girl could get in the way of any friendship." I said without thinking.

"Yeah…wait, what did you say?" Kari looked at me.

"Oh! Nothing….." I quickly said back as silence began to fill the room. Then, I noticed something.

"Hey….those clothes you're wearing look oddly familiar." She was wearing some of my clothes from a couple years ago. Kari nodded.

"I wasn't planning on staying over, and I didn't have any clothes, so your mom said it was alright if I took some of yours." She said.

"Oh….that makes sense…." I agreed.

"H.A., are you going to get ready for school or not?" My mom said.

"Huh?" I looked over at the clock in the kitchen, and I couldn't believe what time it was already.

"Holy crap! It's seven-thirty already? I haven't even taken a shower yet!" I jumped out of my chair and rushed into the bathroom. "I'll meet you on the bus Kari."

In about five minutes, I took a shower, got dressed, brushed my teeth, did any other morning routine, and the bus came as soon as I was ready.

"Good….just in time." I said with a sigh of relief as I ran onto the bus. I looked down the aisle toward Ian and Dwayne. Both gave me a wave, so I shrugged and walked over to them.

"Damnit, H.A. You were the talk of the school yesterday." Dwayne said. I quirked an eyebrow.

"Really?" I questioned.

"Totally! Everyone heard about that run in with a gang you had, so there's so many rumors going around." He continued. "People are saying everything from you kicking the gang's ass, running away from home, hiring a hit-man to kill Ian, getting busy with Kari, even-"

"Whoa whoa whoa!" I interrupted. "What the hell was that last one? I could I have sworn you just said-"

"Getting busy with you-know-who?" Dwayne said again with a grin. He just loved to get on my nerves. "Well, she did follow you out of the school. Why are ya getting so upset anyway? I'd _love_ for people to think I reached home plate with a girl. Hmm…maybe with Trish, I could-"

"TMI, Dwayne. T. M. I." I said, then someone tapped my shoulder and I turned around.

"You forgot this inside." Kari said handing me my backpack.

"Oh, thanks." I said, and when I turned back around to the guys, their mouths hung open.

"Dude! She slept over at your house!? That rumor is _totally_ true!" Dwayne said with enthusiasm in his voice. "Props, man. Props." He said putting his hand up for a hi-five.

"Put your arm down, Dwayne." I said sighing.

"…C'mon….don't leave me hangin…" He said shaking his arm.

"No." I said sternly.

"Awww…." He said putting his arm down.

"What rumor is he talking about?" Kari said. When Dwayne was about to open his mouth, I covered it with my hand.

"You…uh...don't want to know." I said. Once I took my hand off his mouth, I looked over at Ian. He stared back at me.

"What's up?" He said.

"What is up?" I repeated. "After what happened yesterday, I expected more to come out of your mouth."

"Alright, alright….I guess….I owe you an apology." He said shrugging. Kari cleared her throat. Ian rolled his eyes. "I'm sorry too, Kari."

"Like you mean it, Ian." Kari said, giving him a look.

"Nah, it's alright Kari. He said it. That's good enough for me." I grinned, putting my fist up to Ian. "We good?" Ian smirked and pounded my fist.

"Yeah, we're good." Ian said, but was hit in the head by a paper ball.

"Aww…you two kiss and make up now." Someone said in the seat behind us. Both he and his friend started laughing.

"How about I come back there and kick your ass?" Ian said looking back at them.

"Easy, Ian. We don't need to start anything." I said.

"You're right." He agreed, and then threw the paper ball back at the kid's face, nailing him in the eye.

"Ow! My eye!" He yelled, putting his hand over his face.

"There. We're even now." Ian said. I just sighed.

In a few more minutes, our bus pulled into the school, and we all headed inside.

"I'll see you second period, Kari. You too, Ian." I said. "C'mon, Dwayne."

"See ya, H.A." Kari said with a smile. I smiled back waving. Dwayne nudged me in the shoulder.

"So….did anything exciting actually happen last night?" He asked. I sighed again.

"No, Dwayne. Nothing happened last night." I said as we walked to our first class.

"Are you sure? Neither of you did _anything?_"

"Yes, Dwayne. Nothing happened." I repeated.

"Something had to have happened. I know you like her. And I can tell she likes you back." He said.

"Well…she did joke around with me about making out." I really wish I hadn't said that, to Dwayne of all people.

"Aha! I knew something happened!" He said, acting like he found something out.

"She was just joking around. She didn't mean it." I explained. "Stop asking stupid questions and leave me alone."

"Are you sure she didn't mean it?" He asked. "Sounds more like she was flirting with you."

"We just met, Dwayne." I said, trying to deny everything he said. "Why are you so obsessed with us?"

"Cause I want you two to hook up!" He said. "I have a girlfriend, Ian can get any girl he wants, and all that's left is you. Kari's the perfect match, and I know she has a crush on you."

"You really think so?" I asked, actually agreeing with him.

"Dude, why else would she agree to go to the dance with you? It's right in front you, man." He said.

"Yeah….maybe you're right." I said with a smile.

"I knew you liked her." He said, and then got an idea. "Oh, oh! You know what you should do? You should ask her to be your girlfriend."

"I don't know man….it's a little too soon to be thinking about that." I said rubbing the back of my neck.

"C'mon! If she'll agree to go to the dance with you, she'll definitely say yes to being your girlfriend."

"No way…it'll creep her out. We barely know each other." I said.

"You gotta trust me on this." He said.

"No." I said again.

"Trust me!"

"No!"

"Trust me!"

"No!"

"Trust me!"

"Damnit, Dwayne. I said no! I'm not asking her!" I yelled. Another kid in the hall looked at us.

"First the gang, now this? Man, you have anger issues, freak." He said. I looked over at him.

"I'm not in the mood, kid." I said, putting my fist up.

"You wanna take a shot at me?" He said looking back at me. I was about to punch him, but I put my fist down and sighed.

"Ah, you're not worth my time." I said.

"Loser…" He said, before walking away. I rolled my eyes.

"C'mon H.A." Dwayne continued. "I _promise_ you that she will say yes. You can trust me 100 percent on this."

"Alright, Dwayne." I gave in. "If you really think she'll say yes, then I'll ask her next period."

"Awesome!" He said putting his hand up again. He gestured me to give him a hi-five. I just rolled my eyes and gave it to him.

"You better be right on this." I said.

"You've got nothing to worry about. It's in the bag." He said with a smile as we heading into the classroom.

As the first bell rang, Kari's voice was heard throughout the school.

"Welcome to the second day of the school year everyone!" She began and cleared her throat. "To start things off, I hope all of you have made plans to go to the school dance tomorrow. Remember to bring all your family and friends. It starts at six. We hope to see you there and have a good time. In other news, the lost and found has its first item put into it. Whoever lost a light-blue iPod, be sure to check by the lost and found. Sign-ups for this year's football team will start on Monday, and sign-ups for SADD will start today. Those are the announcements. Have a good day."

"So…is her voice music to your ears, H.A.?" Dwayne asked.

"Shut up, Dwayne." I said, not even looking at him. I was very nervous about next period. I couldn't believe Dwayne talked me into asking Kari to be my girlfriend, and I just had the feeling that something will go wrong.

Meanwhile, Ian was messing around in the back of his Math class. Math was never his strong-point, and I'm willing to bet it was his fault it wasn't. He was busy doodling something about tossing the Math teacher out a plane, when Kari walked into the classroom. She immediately darted to the chair next to him.

"O.K. Ian. I want to know right now why you said that in lunch yesterday." She said.

"It was nothing really." He replied. "Me and H.A. are cool with it, so we can just drop the whole thing."

"I don't want to drop it." Kari said. "When I first met you yesterday, you seemed like such a nice guy, and that thing in the lunch room came out of nowhere."

"I was just a little confused over why you turned my offer to the dance down." He said.

"I'm still not telling you why until you give me a _good_ reason why you acted the way you did." Kari said.

"Alright, alright! I like you, O.K.?" Ian blurted out. "There? You happy? I wanted to go to the dance with you, and I was jealous when you picked H.A. over me."

Kari felt guilty all of a sudden. "I'm sorry….I didn't know."

"Wasn't it obvious?" Ian said as he put his feet on the desk in front of him. Kari just shook her head. "Should've been."

"I didn't know that it would cause so much trouble." She said. "I bet H.A. wouldn't take it this badly if I turned him down."

"Then why don't you and go with me?" Ian said with a grin.

"You're unbelievable!" Kari said with a raised voice.

"Kari! Please be quiet." The teacher said. She nodded.

"I'm done talking to you, Ian. I need to pay attention to class." Kari said turning back to the front of the room.

"Whatever." Ian said rolling his eyes. He went back to doodling on his paper.

After the bell rang, I grabbed my stuff and headed over to my locker, and saw Kari at hers already.

"There she is…." I thought. I figured I'd wait until we got to class to ask her. She looked over at me and waved.

"Hi H.A." She said. I waved back.

"Hey…how did first period go with Ian?" I asked.

"O.K. I guess." She said.

"Anything exciting happen?"

"Uh…no." She lied.

"Oh. Well, let's get to class now before we're late." I said. She nodded and we headed toward our study hall. Once we entered, I saw Dwayne, and he gave me a thumbs up. I just nodded to him.

"So…uh…Kari." I began. "Do you wanna chat?"

"Sure H.A." She said with a smile as we sat down. "What do you wanna talk about?"

"You know how you said yes to me about going to the dance?" I questioned.

"Yeah, what about it?" She asked.

"There's…something else I wanted to ask you." This is it. "We've gotten to know each other pretty well yesterday and…well…we went through a lot too…" I'm gunna do it. "So….I was just wondering….do you like…wanna…..be my girlfriend?"

Kari completely wasn't expecting this, and I was sure Ian and Dwayne were overhearing as well. I just sat there, hoping to hear the answer I wanted. She began to speak.

"H.A…I…..I don't know how to say this…but…uh..." She paused. "Look…I hate to put it this way…but I have to say…"

My mind was screaming. "Please don't say it. Please do NOT say the word I'm thinking of!" I thought.

"…No…" She said.

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**And so, I leave you with a cliff hanger. Maybe this will give me an incentive to write the next one quickly. How will H.A. react to Kari's rejection? Heck, I don't even know yet. :P Now on to the comments:**

**Kitsune Disciple: **Yes, Kari was teasing H.A., but I guess all it was doing was leading H.A. in the wrong direction?

**cloveria1215: **I agree entirely. :P

**Sir Chase Vonvit:** Filler is always good. :D

**Sean the hedgehog:** I'm assuming you got the update you wanted sooner than you expected? :P


	10. Chapter 10

**Wow. It's been a long time since I updated. Real life keeps bring more and more things to me. I've been up on a busy schedule for two months straight. (2 jobs, college, a girlfriend, and many other things) But enough with my excuses. The new chapter is up, and I'm done promising to get a new one up in a week. It's not working, and I feel bad saying that I'll get one done then. As far as I know, they'll go up when they go up. :P I will say I won't take two months per chapter though. ;) O.K., now that that is out of the way, on to the story.

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"…I don't understand…" I said, as I couldn't think of anything else to say to Kari's response. I felt a complete set of emotions: embarrassment, frustration, loneliness, and of course rejection. All I wanted to do at that moment was disappear.

"Look…H.A…it's just really too soon to be thinking about that." She said. Those words sure sounded familiar. All I did was look directly at Dwayne, who was giving me a guilty smile.

"But…it just seemed like the right time." I lied. "I mean, all the teasing, the fact you stood up for me all the time, the way you 'denied' my mother's assumption between us being together."

"I'm sorry if I lead you in the wrong direction, H.A." She said. "To be honest…it's kinda creeping me out. We only met yesterday." Another set of words I believe I said just moments ago. This time I stood up. Dwayne was clearly sweating at this point.

"Yeah…I guess that makes sense…" I said with my head down, but I quickly looked over at Dwayne, who was giving me the "Shit, I messed up" look.

"Dwayne…we gotta talk outside." I said.

"Wait, H.A…what did Dwayne do?" Kari asked. I ignored her, grabbed Dwayne by the shirt, and headed outside, which was easy to do since there was no teacher in our study hall. Gotta hand it to the school for really trying to keep track of us. Kari just looked at the door, and then at Ian, who just shrugged.

"So…where are we going?" He asked as we walking down the hall.

"Just away from there, since I know Ian and Kari would eavesdrop on our conversation." I answered as we stopped by a set of lockers.

"I know exactly what you're going to say, dude." Dwayne said, as I just crossed my arms. "I'm really sorry. She led me in the wrong direction. I thought that-"

"Yes…you _thought_ that she had the 'hots' for me." I interrupted. "You fucked up, and I'm the one paying for it."

"Yikes! It's not like you had to listen to me." Dwayne said.

"Come on. You pushed me into it." I said. "Dude, she totally likes you. I can tell. Ask her out El-Oh-El." I mimicked him in a comedic tone.

"Alright, I get it!" Dwayne said, getting a little bit annoyed with my attitude. "I mean, man, take a chill pill."

"Oh, don't give me that!" I shouted back. "Now, every conversation is just going to be completely awkward with her. I won't be able to talk to her without that coming up. Hell, it'll be weird to just to be _around_ her."

"Dude, you act like she's the last girl on Mobius!" Dwayne said. "You're definitely out of control right now!"

"Out of control? Name _one _other girl that did not criticize, or fucking laugh at me over my two tails!" I shouted. "Come on! Name one!"

Dwayne stood there trying to think of an answer besides zero.

"Exactly! There are none! NONE!" I said. "Kari was the only one, and my shot with her was just completely ruined by this whole stupid mess!"

"Cool it, man!" Dwayne said. "You're overreacting! Who's to say that you can't ask her later when you get to know each other better? She never said she wasn't going to talk to you again."

"You don't get it, do you?" I said. "Did you know that Ian likes her too?"

"So? It's not like Kari has liked the way Ian's acted around her. You don't need to worry about him." Dwayne said getting in my face. "You need to worry about yourself right now. I still think you're going crazy over nothing."

"And I think you need to shut up!" I said, shoving him.

"Make me!" Dwayne replied shoving me.

I didn't respond. Instead, I punched Dwayne right in the face. I've been in a few fights in school, so I wasn't exactly the scrawniest fox you'd see. He wiped his face, and saw blood on his hand. He couldn't believe what just happened.

"Dude….did you just hit me?" He said.

"No, it was a strong gust of wind. Of course I fucking hit you!" I shouted back.

"Alright, I'm done talking to you!" He said taking his own shot at me. I grabbed his arm with my hand, but then he shoved me against a locker. He tried to bang my head against the locker, but I pushed myself out of the way and pushed him against the locker face first. Suddenly, Ian came running down the hall.

"Whoa whoa whoa!!! What the hell are you two doing!?" He yelled, pushing us apart.

"I was trying to calm H.A. down. He just went all insane-like." Dwayne explained. Ian gave him a look.

"Right…you looked so calm yourself." Ian said. "And what about you?" He looked at me. "I would sooner bet myself to go ballistic than you. What the hell happened?"

I took a deep breath. "Well, asking Kari to be my girlfriend was all his idea."

"You didn't have to listen to me!" Dwayne interrupted.

"You, shut up." Ian said to Dwayne, still holding us apart. "So…you're telling me you're going crazy because Kari turned you down? What are you, fucking stupid?" He said. "I thought you had more brains than that, H.A."

"It wouldn't even have happened, if this bastard didn't push me into doing something so stupid." I said trying to break Ian's grip on me.

"I said stop, you idiot!" Ian said pushing me against a locker. "You need to calm the fuck down. I'll talk to Kari about it. You two stay put, and don't kill each other for God's sake."

As he walked back to the classroom, I stared at Dwayne angrily as he was holding his nose to stop the bleeding. He stared back at me.

"H.A…what do you want me to do?" He said. "I'd take it back if I could, really. I'm sorry."

I took another deep breath. "Eh…fuck it. Ian's right and you're right, too. Apology accepted."

"Thanks…are we good?" He said.

"Yeah." I put my hand out.

"A handshake?" He said. "Dude, you should know that I only like to get a pound or something." He stuck out his fist.

I pounded his fist and laughed. "Who would have guessed Ian would be the voice of reason in all of this? That guy has the least patience out of all of us." Dwayne laughed with me.

"Oh yeah, definitely. And the way he's ordering us around like we're his pets. Ha! I bet you could easily take him if you two got into a real fight. You sure can throw a punch." He rubbed his face.

"Thanks, but I really hope we don't get into another fight." I said. "It's day two of the school year, and I've already gotten into fights with both of you guys."

"Don't sweat it, man. We were bound to get on each other's nerves eventually."

"Over a girl of all things." I said shaking my head. Looking back at the way I acted a few minutes ago, I felt like a complete jerk. Ian came out of the classroom.

"Yo, H.A." He said. "Kari wants to talk to you." I headed back in, and sat down by Kari.

"So…what did Ian tell you?" I asked.

"He just told me how much Dwayne pushed you into doing it." She answered. "You didn't hurt him, did you?"

"Well…actually…I kinda hit him…in the face." I mumbled.

"H.A.!" She said jabbing me the arm. "He's your friend! Why would you do that?"

"I don't know. I lost my temper…b-but, we're all good now! It's past and done." I said. There was a bit of awkward silence.

"So…you really do have feelings for me, huh?" She said, looking at the ground, shuffling her feet.

"Yeah, I didn't wanna tell you so soon since I knew it would creep you out, but you know how it all went. I'm guessing everything is gunna be awkward around us from now on, huh. Me liking you, and you not liking me…"

"Oh please H.A." She said rolling her eyes. "Did I ever say never?" My eyes lit up when she said that.

"Wait…so…you mean…I still got a shot?" I said.

She grinned. "Maybe…if you play your cards right." My mind started screaming, "Yes! Yes! Yes!"

"Heh…so, are we still good for the dance tomorrow?" I asked.

"Of course." She said. Suddenly, Ian and Dwayne came into the room. "Oh, wow! Dwayne, are you alright?"

"I'm doing mighty fine. Why do you ask?" He said with a smile, even though his nose was still bleeding.

"Eh…no reason…" Kari said with a confused look, and turned back to me. "H.A., how hard did you hit him!?" She whispered.

"Well…my hand still kinda hurts…" I said, chuckling with embarrassment.

"Ug…how do guys go from killing each other to best friends in less than 5 minutes?" She said shaking her head. I shrugged.

"Just gotta be one of those guy things." I said with a small smirk. Suddenly, a voice was heard on the loud speaker.

"Will H.A. and Dwayne Gallagher please report to the principal's office please? Thank you."

"Uh oh…." I said.

"Nonono!" Dwayne shouted. "If my parents found out I got in a fight, they'll probably ground me and then I won't see Trish this weekend!"

"Relax Dwayne." I said. "It…could be about anything."

"Oh really? Mind telling me what else you and Dwayne did out in the hall that would make you go to the principal's office?" Ian said.

"You're not helping, Ian." I said angrily. "Whatever it is, we'll get in more trouble if we don't go to his office."

"Try not to have fun without us." Dwayne said following me out of the room.

"See ya later guys." Kari said. After we were gone, she turned over to Ian. "Wait…why didn't they say H.A.'s last name over the loud speaker?"

Ian shrugged. "They never have. Probably just to separate him further from the rest of the school, the bastards they are." He said rolling his eyes.

As we walked down the hall, Dwayne continued to be very nervous, yelling at these "What ifs" and possible outcomes. As for me, I didn't care too much. There's not much my mom could do to me that I would be worried over, unless she finally understands that inviting my dad over is the worst punishment she could do to me.

"Alright, Dwayne! Enough!" I said, finally fed up with his worried bickering.

"But dude…this is gunna ruin my entire weekend." He said. "Trish is really gunna hate me if I have to cancel everything."

"You're parents couldn't be that strict. They seemed to be O.K. with me when I first met them; something that doesn't normally happen." I said.

He shook his head. "Remember when I cheated on that test and got caught? I was grounded for 3 weeks. Imagine what they would do if they found out I got in a fight."

"Well…whatever happens, happens." I said, as we got to the principal's office. He was sitting facing the window outside, so all we could see was the back of his chair.

"Uhh…Principal Tuluwitzki? You wanted to see us?" I said.

"Ah…H.A. and Dwayne." He said spinning his chair around to face us. He was a grey wolf, wearing a blue suit, and had a pair of reading glasses on. Why he was wearing those when he was clearly not reading? I don't know; maybe it's to make him look more intelligent or something.

"I heard you got into another fight H.A." He said taking the glasses off. "Now, I know it's hard what you have to go through here at Mobius High given your uh…situation, but I would like you not to be in my office every other week."

"This fight was different." I responded. "Dwayne is my friend so…there's no harm done. We're still good friends."

Dwayne hadn't said anything yet. He just wanted to get out of there.

"Well, a fight is still a fight, no matter who it's with. Both of you need to be punished. I'm going to call your paren-"

"Nonono! Don't do that!" Dwayne stood up and interrupted. I grabbed his shoulder and brought him down to his seat.

"Sir…if you may let me speak." The principal nodded. "This whole thing was one-hundred percent my fault. I started it, I threw the first punch, and I pushed him into fighting me back. He was only trying to calm me down. Couldn't you leave him off with a warning this time? I'll take double the punishment if you have to."

The principal just sat there scratching his chin. "Hmm…alright."

"What? Really?" Dwayne said. The principal nodded.

"I'm a reasonable man, and I've known H.A. long enough to know that he never lies. You're free to go. Head back to class." He said.

"Thank you, sir." He said, before running out of the room. He wanted to get out of there as fast as he could.

"Now for you, H.A." He began. "What were you doing to start fighting this time?"

"It's not a big deal. It's nothing that will come up ever again." I said.

"Well…if you say so. I'm still calling your parents." He said.

"Uh…parent." I corrected.

"Hmm? Last time I talked to your mother I heard that she was getting back together with Hector."

"Yeah…that didn't work out. It never does." I said.

The principal sighed. "Very well. Now, get back to class."

"Yes sir." I said getting up. "Oh, and thanks for letting Dwayne off easy."

"You're welcome H.A. Now please, I have work to do." He said.

"Alrighty." I said and left the room to head back to study hall. That worked out much better than I had imagined. I really hope I made it up to Dwayne by doing that. After all that crap, the rest of the day should go by smoothly right?

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**Yay, no cliff hanger. :D Now onto the comments:**

**German KSK: **Thanks. I try my best to make the characters as dynamic as possible. The more life they have, the more realistic they feel.

**Kitsune Disciple: **Thanks for not being annoyed at my lack of updates. XD

**Sean the Hedgehog: **Maybe later is definitely the question H.A. is asking in his mind.

**BlackThunder15567:** Thanks. Yup, this family is more dysfunctional that anything I've seen. :P

**animal freak17:** This chapter should have answered your question. I least Kari is still alright with H.A. after that whole experience.


	11. Chapter 11

**It's been the longest ever since I have updated this. I feel awful for never getting to it, but I honestly don't have any excuse. 2010 has definitely been the most dynamic year of my life, and we'll see if I can get a sort of consistent schedule of chapters on this. Enjoy:**

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As I continued back to study hall, I was hit in the back of the head by a paper ball. I ignored it, figuring it was just another kid trying to get on my nerves. Only seconds later, another one came hitting me on the head, and this time I stopped.

"O.K. people, what the hell…" I said, but when I looked around, I didn't see anyone. I shrugged, and decided to pick up the second paper ball and read it.

"Third grade math?" I said surprised. "I know some of the kids here are stupid, but this is ridiculous." I crumpled up the paper, tossed it, and looked around again. "Look, whoever you are, hitting me with paper balls isn't going to get on my nerves too much. You're gunna have to try a little harder than that."

When I started walking again, I was greeted by a very sharp pain in the back of my head, and the force sent me forward a couple feet. I quickly turned around angrily while rubbing the back of my head, and saw a binder on the ground.

"Alright! You got on my nerves!" I said with a slightly raised voice. I looked around yet another time to find someone responsible.

"I've already gotten in a fight today and I'm not afraid to do it again! Definitely not gunna go easy on you when I find out who did th-" I stopped talking when I spotted a small yellow fox across the hallway.

"I-I'm sorry mister…I didn't think it would hurt…" He said looking at his feet. "I…just wanted to get your attention."

"My attention?" I said cooling down a bit with a sigh. "You know…you could have just shouted to me or something. Binders aren't something you should be throwing at people." I rubbed the back of my head again. "What are you doing here anyway? Mobius Elementary is in the building across from here."

"My big brother was gunna bring me to school, but he brung me here instead." He said.

"You want me to find him? He goes to school here right?" The kid nodded. "O.K. then. What class is he in right now?"

"Wait." He said. "He…didn't go to school."

"You mean he skipped class?" The kid looked at me confused. "That means he went somewhere else instead of going to school."

"Yeah! He did that."

"Well…that wasn't very nice of him to just drop you off here." I looked at a clock in the hallway. Study hall was going to end in a few more minutes. "I wish I could help you, but I need to get back to class. You should find a teacher or a hall monitor to help you, O.K.? They will help you back to your school." He nodded. "Alright. See ya, I guess."

I started back to class, but I just couldn't help to think about that kid. Whose brother in their right mind would leave them here like this? I know Shawn is a pain, but I wouldn't have done this to him when he was little. I left a mental note to talk to that guy if I ever got to meet him. As I opened the door to my study hall, I was immediately greeted by Dwayne.

"So…what did he do?" He said, referring to the principal, before I could even say hi.

"He's just gunna call my mom." I said. "That's all he ever does. Sometimes I think he feels sorry for me or something."

"Be happy he's that way with you, H.A." Ian said looking through a gaming magazine he brought to school. "I don't see why you should be complaining about being treated nicely for a change." I just rolled my eyes, and sat by Kari for the last couple minutes of class.

"So Kari…what have you been up to while I was gone?" I asked.

"Hi H.A., I was just doing some homework." She answered. "Dwayne told me everything. That was really nice of you to get him out of trouble."

"It was nothing, really." I replied. "After what I did to him, it's the least I could do to pay him back."

With that, the bell rang, and everyone got up to get to their next class.

"Well, time to have another fun day at gym, H.A.?" Dwayne said with a chuckle as we left the classroom.

"Oh yeah…it's gunna be a blast." I said sarcastically as we walked down the hall. I noticed that both Kari and Ian were both trying to keep themselves from laughing as they walked behind me.

"What's so funny?" I asked, turning my head toward them. Both of them continued to hold back their laughter.

"Looks like you've made a new friend, H.A." Ian said with a chuckle. I stopped walking and turned around.

"What are you talking ab-" I was stopped mid-sentence when something bumped into me, or to be correct, someone. I looked down, and saw the little yellow fox from before. "You?"

"You know who this kid is, H.A.?" Ian questioned.

"Yeah, I saw him in the hall on the way back to class just a few minutes ago." I responded. "I told him to find a teacher but apparently that didn't work out for him."

"I hate little kids." Ian said.

"Aw, come on Ian." Kari said kneeling down in the front of the kid. "I think he's cute. Hi, my name's Kari. What's yours?"

"I'm Mikey." He said.

"How come you're here, Mikey?" Kari said. He started to talk, but I interrupted.

"Apparently his older brother dropped him off here instead of at the Elementary school." I said. "And then he raced off to do something instead of going to school I'm assuming."

"Sounds like a guy I'd like to be friends with." Ian said while chuckling. I whacked him in the arm.

"Dude, this isn't a joke." I said. "Something could have happened to this kid. He's lucky he found someone like me instead of a bully or something."

"Easy, easy. I know that." He said trying to defend himself. "Can't blame a guy for joking around."

"Hmm…I wonder what we're gunna do with him?" I said, but when I looked over toward Kari, I didn't see Mikey by her. "Where'd he go?"

Kari just laughed. "Check behind you, H.A."

"Huh?" I looked behind him and saw that he was tugging on one of my tails. "Hey! Don't do that!"

"Oh cool! You have two tails!" He said happily. "Can you like…fly and stuff?" I pulled him away.

"Heh…" I chuckled at the thought. "No, I can't. Tails don't work like that."

"Dude, we better get going." Dwayne pointed out to me. "The gym teacher would kill us if we were late."

"We can't abandon the kid though." I looked over. "Kari?"

"I wish I could do something H.A., but I'm a group leader of a project next period. They need me." She said.

"A project on the second day of school? What the hell kind of class does that?" Ian questioned.

"Ian! Don't swear in front of Mikey." Kari said.

"Geeze, you act like you're his mother or something." He snapped back. Mikey walked up to him. "…Yes?"

"You're really mean ya know." He said. I started to laugh.

"There's something we can all agree on." I said, noticing that Ian's temper was running a bit. I patted him on the back. "Chill, man. 'Can't blame a guy for joking around' right?"

"Guys we've still gotta do something before next period!" Dwayne said again.

"Oh, yeah." I thought to myself for a second. "Uh….Ian! Could you take him to a teacher or something?"

"What! Are you kidding?" Ian said. "I already told you I hate kids."

"Hey, it's not like we have a choice here." I explained. "Me and Dwayne have gym, which means we get the no tolerance policy, and Kari's got her thing to do. It's not like you plan on paying attention in your next class anyway."

"Even so, I'm not looking over a bratty little kid." He said. "He followed you. He's your problem."

"I'm asking you as a friend to do one thing for me. I'm always doing stuff for you. How often to do I ask you to do anything?"

"Alright, alright!" Ian said giving in. "I'll take him to a friggin' teacher."

"Ian!" Kari yelled.

"Sorrrrrry." He sarcastically apologized and grabbed Mikey's hand. "Come on, kid. Let's get you back to your school."

"Don't hurt him Ian!" Dwayne joked.

"What, are you _trying_ to scare the kid to death?" I said shaking my head. "Come on. We really gotta get to class now."

"That's what I've been sayin' all along!" Dwayne said as we dashed to gym.

"I'll see you later Kari!" I waved. Kari waved back walking toward her class.

"Sometimes I wonder why H.A. hangs out with a guy with that kind of attitude." She said to herself.

"You know what?" Ian said as him and Mikey were walking. "Why I don't I just take you over to your school. I really don't feeling like talking to a teacher right now, and all in all, it'll probably get me out of my next class as well." He smirked.

"Why are you mean?" Mikey asked.

"I'm not mean." Ian bolted back.

"Yes you are. You're not nice to your friends." Mikey said. "Why aren't you nice to your friends?"

"What you are getting at? It's none of your business!" Ian said in a raised voice. "I've just been in a bad mood lately."

"Why?" Mikey asked again.

"What is this, 20 questions!" Ian shouted. "I already told you it's none of your business!"

"See, you're being mean again." He said.

"Christ! Is it a problem that a guy is angry that the girl he likes would rather hang out with his best friend rather than him?" Ian ranted. "Kari _still_ won't tell me why she'd rather go to the dance with H.A. over me. I know I'm tough to get along with, but honestly, H.A. definitely has some feelings issues himself, like getting into two fights already. Why won't she give me a fucking chance after she _already_ turned H.A. down? Why can't I be forgiven over one fucking thing? It's ridiculous!"

Mikey just stood there scared with his hands to his ears.

"You happy?" Ian said opening the door to outside. "Now shut up or I'll leave you outside."

Meanwhile, Dwayne and I were just barely able to get to gym before the bell rang. The teacher came up to us anyway.

"You two got lucky this time." He said. "Even if you're a second late, that's 50 pushups."

"Geeze…even when we're on time we get in trouble." I whispered to Dwayne as the teacher walked away, and Dwayne just smirked at my remark.

"Ya know, dude…I'm still really sorry about pushing you into asking Kari out." He said.

"Meh, it's whatever. Don't really worry about it. Everything's fine." I replied. "Oh, and she told me I still have a shot." I grinned.

"Oh ho!" Dwayne grinned back at me. "You bagged a nice one my brotha! Congratulations to you!"

"Hey, there's nothing happening yet." I said.

"Yeah but you're already taking her to the dance, man!" He said back.

"Remember, I've only known the girl two days, and she already turned me down once. Don't count your chickens before they hatch, ya know?" I said as we headed toward the locker room.

"Whateverrrrrrr." He said back to me.

"Just let me decide when to ask her out, O.K.?" I said with a quick laugh and held the door open for him.

"You know it dude. You know it." He said as he walked inside the locker room.

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**Well, there you have it. Chapter 11. Not much else to say except that I should kick myself to update sooner this time. :P**


	12. Chapter 12

**Lookee here. An update so soon. That's a good start. Hopefully it continues so you people don't wait 6 months for a cliff hanger. :P

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I had a feeling that the rest of the day would go smoothly. A guy can only take so much in a single day after all. I mean there's the rejection by Kari, the fight with Dwayne, and the Mikey incident. I was _exhausted_ much more than I had ever been in a school day before, and the worst part was the day wasn't even over yet.

As I head toward lunch, I searched the hallway for my friends, none of which were in sight. I found this weird because I would always end up running into Ian or Dwayne at some point before hitting the lunch room. One thing I did notice was this one yellow fox with a bruise on his forehead that looked oddly familiar kicking his locker. His fur was all ruffled up like he had been in a fight recently. As I walked by the kid noticed my two tails.

"Whoa whoa whoa!" He said, as he stopped kicking his locker. "If it isn't Mr. Freak once again. I see you got away safely."

"Yeah whatever. Bla bla bla I'm one of a kind. Bla bla bla I'm a freak." I said not caring too much. "Not in the mood, I'm hungry for lunch."

"No, you don't know understand, asshole. I remember you from yesterday." I stopped walking.

"Wait…yesterday…the park?" I said.

"Hehe, you _do _remember me then, don't you?" He pointed to the bruise on his head.

"Oh…shit…the fox gang…" I looked around for the others, but fortunately I couldn't see any of them.

"Relax retard, I'm by myself here. But, this is perfect anyhow!" He grinned. "When you least expect it freak, I'm going to make you pay for what happened yesterday!" He said as he ran off.

"Hey! Wait!" I yelled, but he was already long gone. I sighed. "Great, just what I need. More trouble…"

"H.A.!" I heard Kari's voice booming through the hall. "There you are, I've been looking all over for you!"

"Heh, guess you shoulda checked the lunch room, that's where everyone's going." She just gave me look. "Hey, it was just a joke, don't get mad."

"Hmph! So, how's your day been so far?" She asked.

"Well…better than it began I suppose." I decided not to tell her about my encounter before, since I didn't want her to freak out or anything.

"That's good. Say, do you know where the other guys are?" She said.

"Nope, I've been looking for all three of you and haven't been able to find anyone, well except you now of course." I said.

"Well, it's their loss, I'm hungry." She said walking past me.

"You've got the right idea Kari." I said with a chuckle following behind her.

Meanwhile, Ian was outside walking around town. He decided to not go back to school after bringing Mikey back to Mobius Elementary. He was still kinda pissed about the whole situation with Kari, and was kicking a can as he walked along.

"Fucking assholes…all of 'em." He said kicking the can again. "It's all their fault I'm in a bad mood. H.A. knows how good of a guy I can be, but he's just hidin' that so he can get Kari, the dick. I can't believe he's doing this to me for a damn girl." Ian kicked the can so hard it went out of sight.

"Haha, freak! I knew you'd come back!" A red fox came out from an alley way.

"Back off punk. I'm pissed right now, and I'm not afraid to fight." Ian said turning toward him.

"Oh, my mistake. You look like a certain someone me and my crew ran into yesterday." He cracked his neck. "A nice two tailed freak."

"Two tailed freak?" Ian said with his eyes opening up wider.

"So…you know him?" The fox grinned.

"…" Ian didn't speak for a moment. He looked away and thought. "…Yeah…I do know him. His name's H.A." Suddenly, the yellow fox from before came running down the street. "What the fuck is that?"

"Boss! Boss!" The yellow fox said out of breath. "I…I saw the freak…he's at Mobius High!"

The red fox just punched the yellow fox in the face.

"A lot of fucking help that'll do. That school is huge. Everyone goes there, even you, ya fag." He pointed at Ian. "Besides, I just ran into someone who knows him."

"Hold on!" Ian said. "What the hell are you guys up to?"

The red fox held a pocketknife up to Ian's face. "That's none of your business."

"O.K. then. I guess if you don't want me to take you to him." Ian smirked.

"Errrrr…fine." He growled and put his knife away. "We ran into him yesterday walking in our territory. He said some shit to us, beat up this guy over here, and ran off. We don't take that very kindly if you haven't noticed."

"So what do you wanna do with H.A.?" Ian asked. The yellow fox took out a big knife.

"We wanna slit his fucking throat!" He said with his eyes wide open. The red fox punched him again.

"Hey! We can't just go around killing people just like that you idiot! I don't want the police to find out about us anymore than they have. We gotta keep a low profile." He turned back to Ian. "Excuse my friend. He has some…issues."

"You got that right...psychopath." Ian said. The yellow fox growled at him.

The red fox just glared at him and he stopped growling. "Now…will you take us to him?"

"Hold on, now. What's in it for me?" Ian asked. The red fox snapped his fingers, and a black fox came out from the alley way.

"Cid, how much did we get from that convenience store earlier today?" The red fox asked.

"Uhh…about 250 bucks."

"Alright, kid. We'll give you all of that if you take us to the freak."

"What!" The yellow fox yelled, and once again got punched, this time in the gut.

"Hey, I want this freak found. I hate freaks. I hate people that mess with my crew. And I hate people that think they can get away from the Devil's Followers."

"Holy shit." Ian took a step back, actually showing fear. "You guys are the Devil's Followers? I've heard a lot about your gang."

"Heh." He grinned. "Just call me Derek." Ian cleared his throat and tried to act tough.

"The name's Ian."

"Alright, Ian. Lead the way." Derek said.

"Hold on a second." Ian confronted. "It's probably not a smart idea to get him while he's at school, or even after school. He hangs out with some people, and you said you wanted to keep a low profile right?"

"Hmm…good point. You're smart Ian." Derek said. "I like that. Better than some of the other scum we've had to deal with." He looks over at the yellow fox, who just shrugs.

"You gotta cell number? Just give it to me and I'll let you know when the time's right." Ian said.

"So, you're not friends with this freak, are ya?" Derek said while putting his number in Ian's phone. "You look _a lot _like him, too."

"C'mon. Do I look like the type that'll hang out with him?" Ian said. "Alright, I guess I'll see ya real soon."

"That you shall, Ian." Derek said before Ian started walking away.

"Shit…what the fuck did you get yourself into H.A.?" Ian said as he walked away. "Hopefully those guys won't be able to find me. I know that psycho goes to Mobius High, so this isn't gunna end well. I'm lucky to be able to get them to think I'm on their side for now. You better be thanking me for this H.A. Those guys are basically off your back and now are gunna be looking for me to find you."

Back at school, Kari and I managed to find Dwayne in the lunch room, with his usual two or three lunches.

"Jesus Dwayne, do you always have to eat this much?" I said staring as his mess of a meal.

"How many lunches is that?" Kari asked.

"Eh…three." Dwayne shrugged. "I sometimes go with four if I'm a bit hungrier."

"How you eat this slop day in and day out is beyond me." I said shaking my head. "Wait a minute, does anyone know where Ian is?"

"Now that I think about it, he wasn't in any of my classes today ever since he brought Mikey to his school." Kari said. "You don't think he's skipping, do you?"

"Well…he has been in an awful mood lately." I said crossing my arm. "What do you think Dwayne.

"Hmm?" He said while chomping down food. I sighed.

"Nevermind…" I said as I started eating some of my lunch. "Well, whatever the case may be, it's his loss for missing school."

"So H.A….you excited about the school dance tomorrow?" Kari asked as Dwayne just snickered a little.

"Yeah I'm excited. You already know I've never gone to any of our school's dances before. I guess it'll be a lot of fun." I said.

"You guess?" Kari questioned. "Dances are so much fun! Even if you don't have a date there's still a lot to do."

"Good point, but we're going together, so I'm sure it'll be fun then." I said with a small smile.

"Aww…that was cute." Kari said smiling back. "So umm…H.A…is Ian always in a bad mood like that?"

"Not even close. That's what makes this so weird." I said. "He's normally very chill, but he does have a bit of a temper. It's just weird that he's been so quick to jump on people lately."

"Actually, I remember asking him about it earlier today and he did say he liked me." Kari said.

"I already gathered that from him asking you to the dance. I guess the rejection is killing him more that I thought." I said.

"Actually…I think it's the fact I said yes to you and not him is what's getting to him." Kari said.

"Even so, he's overacting." I said rolling my eyes.

"Say's mister I'm gunna punch my friend." Kari stuck her tongue out at me.

"You got me there. Good point." I said giving up on that argument. "But me and Dwayne are already good just minutes after the fact. This has put Ian in a bad mood for two days now. Don't you think he should've shrugged it off by now? He can have any girl he wants basically. They all fall for him."

"Not me." Kari said laughing.

"Yeah…why is that? I'm not against it or anything." I laughed. "I'm just curious. You said he was pretty cool when you first talked to him."

"Yeah but I didn't know him well at all." She said. "Talking to a guy for one period isn't enough to let me know who they are."

"Well…it was basically the same for me, wasn't it?" I questioned. "I only talked to you for a short time."

Kari chuckled. "Cute H.A. I already told you that there's something about you I like. Something Ian doesn't have, even though you claim to be the same."

I got a bad feeling in my stomach and looked at my tails. "Wait…this isn't a pity thing is it? About my tails?"

"H.A.! You actually think that!" Kari said shocked.

"Nonono it just popped in my head quick." I defended. "When you said I have something Ian doesn't my tails were the first thing I thought of."

"It's in your personality H.A. You can already see it." She said. "Ian's well…you've seen how different you two have been since I've known you."

"True…but Ian's also not himself right now. Trust me; you'll like him a lot more when he's not in a bad mood. The four of us will be a nice group."

"I'm sure we will be." Kari said with a smile.

"So are you gunna eat lunch or what?" I asked. "You haven't even touched your food and lunch only has a few minutes left."

"Oh, right!" She said. "I've just been enjoying our conversation I guess."

"I'll get something outta Ian when I see him tonight or tomorrow." I said. "He better have a good reason for skipping school other than 'I wasn't in a good mood' or 'I just didn't feel like coming back.' Just not like him at all."

"You still got me dude!" Dwayne said, his lunch tray emptied now.

"Nice, I got a living trash can." I said with a chuckle.

"Not funny, man. I…uh…just like eating." Dwayne said looking away. "Damnit, I don't have a comeback to that one."

Suddenly, I heard the lunch room door slam against the wall, and saw Ian running towards me as I turned.

"Ian?" I said. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Long story, H.A., but this is important!" He said. "Yes, I was skipping class, but that's not the point. I was walking through town, and some red fox comes up to me thinking I'm you. We talked for a few minutes and apparently that gang you ran into yesterday was the Devil's Followers."

I just spit my food out. "WHAT!"

"Dude…you got away from them?" Dwayne said. "That's incredible!"

"No it's not you idiot!" Ian shouted. "These guys want H.A. dead after what happened. They even asked me to help get him cornered. I said I would but only because I wanted to get outta there without being stabbed. I'm sure they'll find me now if I don't call their leader sometime soon. One of them even goes to this school."

"Shit…the yellow fox." I mumbled.

"I take it you saw him?" Ian questioned.

"Yeah, he said he'd get back at me for what happened and ran off. I didn't get a chance to say anything."

"So…what do we do about this?" Dwayne asked. None of us spoke for awhile.

"Wait…Ian how are you gunna get a hold of their boss?" I asked.

"I got his cell number, why?"

"Let's see here. I don't know if this would work, but what if we gave him a spot to find me, and called the police to go there as well or something?" I said. "It's a long shot, but maybe that could work.

"It could work, but I'm sure he wouldn't just sit there waiting for you if you weren't there when he got there." Ian said. "He'd know something was up. He'd be expecting to see you _and_ me when he got there."

"Well then, I guess that's what we gotta do." I said standing up.

"Wait, wait." Ian interrupted. "We don't gotta go through with this so soon. We can wait a few days on this. I told him I'd wait for the right time to 'get you by yourself' and all so maybe we could figure out another plan in the meantime."

"Alright then, I guess." I sighed. "Too much damn drama this year already."

"You're telling me." Dwayne said just completely confused about the whole mess.

"Thanks for letting me know about this, Ian." I said. "I could've easily been jumped some random day after school, but now we can be ready for anything."

"Don't worry about it." Ian said. "It's nothing. Just didn't want you dead that's all."

"Right." I chuckled. "That's what it is." I heard the bell ring. "Alright guys. Guess we head our separate ways for the rest of the day."

"Yup, I'll catch ya later, dudes." Dwayne said walking off, leaving his tray of garbage behind.

"Guess I'll head to my next class. Didn't really get to go to them yesterday." I said with a laugh. "Later Kari. See ya Ian."

"O.K. H.A." Kari said with a smile. Ian continued to just stand there, as did Kari. It was a slightly awkward scene.

"So...Ian…thanks for doing that for H.A." She spoke up.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." Ian said. "Talk to me straight, what do you have against me."

"What do you mean?" Kari asked.

"Please, it's obvious that you don't want me around."

"Ian, I never said that."

"Strange, your actions show it quite well." He said walking away.

"Ugg…Ian is this about me not taking up your offer for the dance?" She said. "We hardly knew each other!"

"Hmm...you hardly knew H.A. too." He said not turning around.

"…It's different with him…" She said looking away.

"And it was different with me. The way you act around Dwayne is different than me. Things with me and H.A. have been awful since you got here." He turned around toward her. "I'm gunna fix my friendship with him. I don't want you fucking it up anymore."

"Ian…I never tried t-"

"I'll see you in class, Kari." He said as he left the lunch room. Kari didn't have anything else to say and left in the other direction.

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**There you have it. Another interlocking plot between Ian and Kari's friendship and the gang. Stuff's gunna be going down soon. :P**


	13. Chapter 13

**Sweet deal, another update. I think here the story is starting get easier to push forward and instead of creating more and more twists and plot devices everything is starting to mold together. I do know I'm not going to have enough time to do weekly updates, so they will be sporadic, but they'll never be too far apart, I promise you that. This chapter here may be a tad short, but it definitely has important content within it. Now, with that said, let's continue on with Chapter 13!

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What Ian had said really started making Kari think as she headed toward her next class.

"Did I really make it seem like I was pushing him away?" She thought. "Was I actually trying to push him away without realizing it? Ian was being a jerk for awhile, and made fun of H.A. too. Maybe that's why, cause I want to protect my friends. But Ian is also my friend, or should be. Auugghh! This is so stupid! I hate high school drama!"

"Did you say something?" Someone asked. Kari looked up and saw a dark blue fox.

"N-No, not really." She answered.

"Somethin' bothering you?" He asked. "I saw you talking to yourself and ya looked really deep in thought."

"It's nothing, really. I gotta get to class." He put his hand in front of her.

"Listen, I'm not gunna beat around the bush here. I know ya hang out with that two tailed guy. I got into a nasty fight with him last year, but I wanna fix things up."

"So you're gunna use me to get to him?" Kari said sounding a little insulted.

"Don't take it like that, babe." He said. "I'd like to join your little group thing ya got goin' on here."

"You mean friends?" She said rolling her eyes.

"Yeah, that." He said. "I couldn't help but notice you guys are pretty close."

"Yeah…close." She said unsurely.

"Name's Devon." He said.

"I'm Kari. And umm…we're gunna be late to class. What do you have?"

"I'ma senior so I gotta head this way." He said pointing in the opposite direction Kari was going.

"Well, I'm going the other way so I guess I'll talk to later?" Kari said.

"Sure." He said walking away. "Oh, and don't let that two tailed guy fool ya. He's gotta mean temper if you push his buttons right. Week in the hospital…damn man."

"Uh…O.K." Kari said confused, as she entered her class. "What was that all about?" She thought, and saw Ian take the seat in front of her.

"Hey Ian." She said, trying to sound cheerful.

"Oh…hi." Ian said without turning around. Kari just sighed.

"Maybe I'll get to him after school." She thought. Neither of the two said a word to each other for the rest of the period.

A few hours later, the bell rang for everyone to head out. Dwayne and I found each other and walked outside.

"So…interesting day, eh bro?" Dwayne said nudging me.

"You're telling me!" I said with a loud sigh. "What the hell did I do to deserve this type of stuff!"

"Girls man. They always do this." Dwayne said snickering, before being hit in the back of the head by Kari.

"Hey! That wasn't very nice." She said staring at him.

"I was kidding, I was kidding!" He said laughing. "Just a joke, Kari."

"I know it was, but it was still mean." She said. "Where's Ian."

"He's always slow to get outta school." I said stretching. "I dunno why. I always wanna get out of there as soon as possible every day."

"Oh…O.K. I just need to talk to him." She said.

"About what?" I asked.

"Nothing important, it's alright H.A."

"Uh huh…" I looked conspicuously, but said no more. Before long, Ian was seen leaving the building.

"About time man!" Dwayne said. "Jeeze you take forever."

"Can it. I'm not in a race." Ian said. "Now let's head to the nearest convenient store cause I'm starved for some snack food."

"Uh…Ian, could we talk for a minute?" Kari asked.

"Sure, sure. Whatever. Whadda ya what?"

"Umm…could we talk alone?" He shrugged.

"Fine, whatever. BRB guys." He said as he followed Kari to the side of the school building.

Dwayne just looked at me weird. "What was that all about?"

"I dunno for sure, but something's going on between those two, and it's not good." I said staring at their location.

"Alright, Ian. Explain to me what happened in the lunch room." She said. "Why did you suddenly come up with all these accusations toward me? I wanna be your friend, I don't want to shut you out."

"Have you seen the way you've acted toward me the two days I've known you?" He said.

"What do you mea-"

"For the first hour I knew you, we were good. Then after that, it was bullshit after bullshit. I haven't gotten a good conversation with you since."

"It didn't help that you were a complete immature person when I turned you down for the da-"

"Oh for fuck's sake Kari! Do you honestly think I give a shit about that anymore!" He yelled. "I was being nice after that!"

"No you weren't! You acted like a complete jerk any chance you could get!" She said in a raised voice back at him.

"Sure, whatever you say. I'm apparently _always_ the bad guy. You can't _ever_ be wrong!"

"Stop being so immature, Ian! I'm trying to be nice!"

"Yelling in my face isn't 'Trying to be nice' last time I checked!"

"Well I wouldn't be yelling in my face if you would just be a good friend to me and H.A.!"

"Don't you dare tell me that! I've been friends with H.A. for years so shut up you fucking bitch!"

Kari gasped and just hit Ian across the face for his remark. He of course retaliated and hit her in the face as well. Ian was a pretty tough guy so it wasn't a little slap. That's when I darted over.

"Hey! What the hell are you two doing!" I looked at Kari. Her eyes were watering a little and her cheek was bruised. "Jesus Ian, what the hell is this?"

"I lost my temper…sorry." He said wiping his face. "Not like I was the only one guilty of punching here."

"What is wrong with you two? I want an answer." I demanded. "You two haven't been good since you first met."

Kari just hugged me. "I'm sorry H.A. It's my fault. I was pushing Ian away."

"Kari…it's alright. We'll get this worked out." I said pulling her away to face me. "Trust me. I know Ian better than anyone." I looked over at Ian. "So…tell me what's up."

"She said it herself. I felt like I was getting pushed out of our group by her."

"O.K., and if you honestly felt that way, why have you had this attitude for?" I asked.

"You know the story H.A. I like her, and she turned me down, but I don't care about that anymore. I just want things back to the way they were last year, but she's making it difficult."

"How am I making it difficult?" Kari said.

"Remember what you told me when I talked to you about the fight H.A. and Dwayne had?" He said. "I explained everything to you, how you turning H.A. down caused him to explode like that. I thought it was stupid for him to act that way, cause I was turned down myself and you didn't see me beat up my friends. And then…oh, and then, you had the nerve to tell me to my face…something just…unbelievable."

"Tell what?" I asked, looking at Kari. She sighed.

"I had almost forgotten..." She said quietly.

"Ian…if this is your way of trying to get me to go to the dance with you, then don't. I don't see myself with you in the future, or ever. Yeah we've only known each other shortly, and I just turned H.A. down, but you, I just don't see it. I can hardly even see us being friends together." Ian recited her words, having them fresh in his mind. I looked at Kari once again.

"…Did you actually say that?" I asked.

"I don't remember…I must've blocked it out of my mind or something."

"Kari…did you say that?" I asked again. She paused.

"…Yes H.A." She said quietly. "I did say that to him."

"Did you mean every word of that? Cause honestly if you can't be friends with Ian you can't be friends with me." As I said that, Ian's eyes widen. He honestly couldn't believe that I chose him over Kari, who was equally as surprised.

"You're choosing Ian over me? What do you mean by that? What happened to the guy who basically beat up his friend for me?"

"Kari…I won't lie. I do love you. Even though we've only known each other for a couple days, and you may not have the same feelings, I'm honestly in love with you. But Ian and I go way back. He's helped me go through all of elementary school, and most of high school. And trust me, he's not a dick. He's not a jerk either. He's an awesome guy, and I don't see why you two can't get along." I looked at both of them. "Look, make this easy. Are you really that different from each other that you can't just forgive and forget?"

They both looked down.

"I'm not doing this whole pick one and lose the other thing, cause that's just idiotic and stupid." I said. "It'll be much easier if we just all got along. Look at me and Dwayne. I kicked his ass earlier today and we're fine."

"Hey…you didn't kick my ass." He said. "And I put some hits in you to-"

"It's simple." I said ignoring Dwayne. "Just be friends. C'mon you guys."

Everyone was silent for a few minutes, but Ian broke it with just a small chuckle.

"Look at this guy, thinking he's some kinda psychology major." He said. "He's got some truth to those words though. I think I can forgive a few words. I mean look at it. Me being hurt by words? Pfft! I'd look like a weak idiot."

"That's one way to put it, but yeah." I shrugged.

"Alright Kari. I'll forgive and forget if you're willing to." He said putting his hand out.

"Of course Ian. I'm sorry for what I said." She said and hugged him instead of shaking his hand.

"Umm…I'm not used to this." He said.

"Better be. Kari likes to hug." I said laughing.

"Noooo, I'm not a hugger! I'm too tough for that!" He said joking trying to push Kari off.

"Haha, Ian. Is this what you're really like?" She said chuckling, finally letting him go.

"What? You didn't know?" He said with a smirk. "I'm fucking awesome."

"Sure, buddy. The awesome-est." I said rolling my eyes. "Now how about that food you were talking about?"

"Damn I almost forgot!" Ian said excited. "I want some microwave burritos!"

"Do you even have money?" Kari asked.

"Oh yeah…H.A.?" He said.

"Ug…fine. I'm paying." I said sighing.

"This is why we have you around man." He said.

"Woo, let's celebrate by mooching off H.A.!" Dwayne said. "Can you buy for me too?"

"No." I said.

"Why?" He asked.

"Cause you already have money Dwayne. I don't need to buy for you." I said.

"Yeah that makes sense…" Dwayne said as we headed off to the store. Kari started laughing.

"Enjoying this conversation Kari?" I asked.

"Of course. You guys are hilarious." She said with a smile.

"And awesome. Never forget awesome." Ian said. "Well…I am anyway.

"Yes…we know this already Ian." I said rolling my eyes again.

"Can't say it enough man." He said.

"What did I tell you before?" I whispered to Kari. "Pretty cool guy right?"

"Yeah." She nodded. "Thanks for fixing this H.A."

"It was nothing." I said. "I like to keep my friends close."

"I can't wait for the dance tomorrow." She said.

"Me neither. It'll be a blast."

"Oh and one more thing."

"What's that?" I asked.

"I bet I'm more awesome than Ian!" She said loud enough for Ian to hear.

"What? Blasphemy, woman!" He said running after her. "I'll get you for those words!"

"Haha, no you won't!" She said running away. I just looked at them and laughed.

"So…you worried?" Dwayne asked.

"About those two? Nah. Seems like they're getting along fine." I said.

"No, I mean about Ian's crush on her. You don't think she'll…ya know what I mean man."

"Well…that's something I am not going to worry about Dwayne. Not for a long time." I said watching the two of them chase each other. "C'mon, I'm starved."

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**Alright! I really enjoyed writing this one folks. Like I said, things are starting to mold together, and it's only the beginning. I've still got much more in store for you fellow readers. Trust me I've got some sweet ideas upcoming in the future.**


	14. Chapter 14

**Once again I fail to bring an update at a reasonable pace, but I think this chapter could make it up to you. It's not only long, but it has a lot of stuff going down in it. I won't keep you waiting any long so have fun reading.**

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I woke up irritated by the sound of my alarm clock and slammed the off button on it. As I rubbed my eyes getting out of bed, I realized today was the day. The school dance was tonight.

"After how the past couple days of gone, this one better be easier." I mumbled. "At least the rest of the day yesterday was good and Ian's back to his old self. There's just too much damn drama." I heard a knock at the door.

"H.A., are you up yet?" My mom asked opening my door. I yawned.

"Half way there…"

"Alright, just wondering. I didn't have time to make breakfast today so you can fix yourself something, O.K.?" She said. "I gotta leave for work early so make sure Shawn makes it on the bus with you."

"Gotcha." I replied and stretched.

"Thanks, have fun at school. Bye." She said closing the door.

"Bye." I stood up and headed to the bathroom. As I brushed my teeth, I had already forgotten to wake Shawn. So I headed over to his room and knocked on the door.

"Dude, it's time to wake up. Bus is gunna be here soon." I said.

"Five more minutes…" He mumbled. I opened the door.

"I'm not mom, so I'm not doing all the morning shit for you. Come on. Get up or I'll throw you out of bed."

"Sheesh! Fine, and I'm telling mom you swore." He said grabbing some clothes from his dresser. "Where is she?"

"She had to leave for work early. You're on your own for getting ready." I said walking back to the bathroom and finished brushing my teeth.

"Psshhh, I'm thirteen I think I can handle that H.A. I'm not a little kid."

"You are in my eyes." I said basically ignoring him.

"Shut up! I am not!"

"Whatever you say." I said, once again not caring.

"Grrr…I hate you sometimes." He said pouting.

"Love you too, buddy." I grinned as I left the bathroom to get some clothes. That's when I started thinking about the dance.

"Things haven't been peachy with Kari so far." I thought. "Between showing my feelings for her too soon and the differences she had with Ian, I'm surprised she's still so easily able to stick around. Hopefully I can get back on the right foot with the dance, but I've never been to a dance before. Hell, I didn't even know how to dance."

After realizing I just fell into a daze, I shook my head and finished getting dressed.

"Shawn! Are you almost ready?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'm just gunna eat breakfast." He responded from his room. I looked at the clock one more time.

"We've got probably ten minutes before the bus comes still, alright." I said heading to the kitchen. I grabbed a box of cereal and Shawn did the same. As we sat down to eat breakfast, Shawn asked the most awkward question.

"H.A. Do you hate dad?"

I paused. "Why would you ask that?"

"I dunno. I was just thinking about Wednesday at dinner and how you two were fighting."

"Me and dad have always fought since I was old enough to speak." I started eating, hoping Shawn would just stop talking.

"Why?" He asked. I sighed.

"Isn't it obvious? He thinks I'm a freak, just like the kids at school do. I'm surprised you're not on his side."

"I didn't know there were sides." He said confused.

"Never mind Shawn, just finish eating." I said aggravated.

A few minutes later, the bus stopped by our house, and Shawn and I both hopped on. I was once again greeted by Ian and Dwayne.

"How goes it, buds?" I asked sitting down in the seat in front of them.

"Meh…I wanna sleep…" Ian mumbled.

"Awesome as always, man." Dwayne said giving me a fist bump. "I can't wait for this weekend. You guys are still good for meeting Trish right?"

"Yeah I'm still free this weekend. Ian?" I asked and got no response. "Yo, Ian!" I looked and he had already fallen asleep.

"I think he was up till like three something playing games, dude." Dwayne said.

"I'll wake him up." I said as I slapped him on the side of his face. "Hey! Get up!"

"Huh? What?" He said looking around.

"You in for this weekend at Dwayne's? His girlfriend is gunna be there." I said.

"Yeah yeah, whatever. Just let me sleep, dammit." He said shutting his eyes.

"Lazy-ass." I said.

"Stuck up loser." He responded. I just smirked and shook my head.

"Sooooo H.A. You ready for tonight?" Dwayne said with a smile. I sighed.

"Yeah, I hope so. Never been to a school dance before."

"It's just a dance." Ian mumbled. "Drink some punch, hang out with friends, maybe dance a bit. What's the big deal?"

"Well he's going with Kari remember?" Dwayne said. "This is huge for him."

"Bla bla Kari bla bla whatever man." He said. "She's just a friend. It's no different than going with either of us except she's a girl."

"Then why don't you two go together?" I laughed.

"Shut up H.A." Ian said.

"Sounds like someone's cranky today." I replied, trying to be as big of a dick as possible to him.

"Why you raggin' on me so much today?" He said in an irritated tone.

"You're fun to mess with when you get no sleep." I said laughing still.

"Well, quit fucking with me. I'm tired." He said closing his eyes again.

"Well, you're not getting sleep now, we just got to school." I said pointing out the window.

"God dammit." He mumbled. As we exited the bus, Dwayne and I fist bumped once again on successfully pissing off Ian for the millionth time.

"It never gets old, man." Dwayne said.

"He needs to be tired every morning." I said. "It always brightens my morning to see him like this."

As I headed to my locker, I noticed some people crowding around in the hallway by it. As they saw me they all ran off, and I just raised an eyebrow in complete confusion. When I opened my locker, all of my stuff and school supplies just piled on top of me.

"God dammit." I said picking things up. "They just love to rearrange everything in my locker don't they. Alright, better clean this up before class."

Kari walked up behind me. "H.A. what happened?"

"Bunch of assholes that's what happened." I replied. She sat down by me and started to help clean it up. "You don't have to, Kari. Don't you have morning announcements to do?"

" It's fine." She smiled. "I've got plenty of time to get to the office."

"Whatever you say." I said as we spent a couple minutes getting my stuff together.

"There, that should do it." She said wiping her hands.

"Thanks Kari. I'll see you in second period. Oh, and watch out for Ian." I snickered. "He's a bit cranky today."

"Wha?" She said but I had already ran off to class. The blue hedgehog shrugged and headed off to do the morning announcements. I had barely made it to class before the bell rang, and jumped in my seat before the teacher saw.

"Dude, what took you so long?" Dwayne whispered.

"The usual. Kids making my all stuff collapse on me. I still got here though."

"One day you'll get back at them bro." He said giving me a quick fist pump.

"Haha, that'll be the day." I chuckled.

Meanwhile, Ian was doodling in the back of his class. Kari came to class after finishing the announcements, and sat by Ian.

"So, I was told you're pretty cranky today." She said with a small smirk.

"Meh, a little bit. H.A. was giving me crap on the bus so it kinda messed up my mood. I'm doing just fine." Ian said stretching, but quickly went back to work on his doodling.

"Do you ever pay attention in class?" She asked.

"What's the point?" He said.

"Well, it'll help you learn dummy." She said.

"I do the homework, ace the tests and I'm done. Paying attention in class isn't gunna get me more points." He said back.

"I'm sure the teachers love you." Kari said sarcastically before turning around and began taking notes.

"And I'm sure you're the world's best teachers pet." Ian said with a small snicker. Kari just swung her leg backward and hit Ian in the shin.

"Ack!" He shouted and held his shin.

"Ian! Please be quiet!" The teacher said.

"…Sorry…" He mumbled and got closer to Kari. "You're the worst."

"I try, Ian." She said with a small laugh.

As first period ended, everyone headed towards their lockers. Kari was walking along before someone called out to her.

"Ah, Kari! There ya are!" It was Devon. "How's ya day goin'?"

"Umm..it's only been one period." She said.

"How it goes could set the mood for the whole day, right?" He said winking.

"Umm…sure." She said confused. Just then, Ian ran up from behind and held Devon up by his collar.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" He said in a raised voice. "I don't know what you're trying on Kari, but stay the fuck away."

"Ian! What are you doing?" Kari said.

"This guy is bad news, Kari." Ian responded.

"He's been nice to me so far. Devon told me that him and H.A. got into a bad fight and he wants to make it up to us."

"That's what he wants you to think." Ian said. "He almost got H.A. kicked out of school for faking a hospital visit and-"

Ian was cut off by Devon pushing him off and on to the ground.

"I'm tryin' to play nice, damnit!" He said. "I don't want to start anythin' here."

"You already did by talking to Kari!" Ian said getting up and trying to punch Devon, but he dodged it and threw Ian against a locker.

"Ya do know I'm a bit better at fightin' than you." Devon said. "It'd be better if ya quit while yur still ahead."

"I don't back down you asshole!" Ian said. "This is for everything you've done to H.A. and me!" He threw out his fist, and this time got a hit right on Devon's face.

"Now ya done it." Devon said cracking his knuckles.

"Damnit, H.A." Ian thought. "Where are you? I could use your help here."

Meanwhile, I stood by my locker looking around for Kari.

"Weird…she's normally faster than this. I guess I'll head to study hall without her. Hope she's not too late."

As I walked down the hall, I saw multiple students running in the opposite direction.

"What the?" I said confused. "Hey, you! What's going on?"

"Can it, freak." He said before running off. I just sighed.

"It's probably none of my business anyway. I've had enough trouble for one school year."

As I entered the classroom, I noticed that only Dwayne and some other people were there.

"Hey, do you know where Kari and Ian are?" I asked.

"No clue, man." He said shrugging.

"Weird…Kari never went to her locker and now Ian's not here." Suddenly, the bell rang. "And now both are late for class. I'd expect this from Ian, but Kari never misses a class, not even study hall."

"So you wanna wait around for them?" Dwayne asked.

"Oh no…" I just realized something. "I saw a bunch of people running towards the opposite side of the school. There's no way this is a coincidence." I ran out of the classroom and head in the direction I thought the kids went. Dwayne followed behind me. After a few minutes, we saw a crowd of people cheering in the hallway.

"Hey you, what's going on here?" I asked someone.

"Doesn't matter to you." He said. I grabbed him and brought him to my face.

"No bullshit, what's going on here, now." I demanded.

"Alright, alright. Devon got into a fight with someone. The guy looks pretty beat up."

"Fuck. Ian…" I said letting go of the kid.

"H.A.!" I heard Kari said as she ran up to me. "Everything just happened so fast…Ian is…and Devon just…I didn't know what to do."

"Slow down Kari. We'll figure things out." I said.

"Well if it ain't Mr. Two Tailed Fox!" Devon called out to me. I just gave him a glare

"What did you do, Devon." I said walking closer.

"Not my fault. He attacked me. Was all self-defense, yup." He said pointing behind himself. There was Ian, sitting against a locker covered in bruises and cuts.

"Ian!" I yelled and ran up to him.

"…Where the fuck have you been…" He said quietly. "I've been waiting for you to back me up…and you're nowhere in sight…asshole…"

"God damnit Devon." I said. "You didn't have to do this."

"What…should I have let the guy beat me up?" He grinned. "That wouldn't make much sense now would it."

"I don't have time to deal with you. Dwayne, help me pick Ian up." I said grabbed one of Ian's arms.

"…You pussy…fight him." Ian said looking at me.

"I'd rather get you to the nurse's office." I responded as me and Dwayne pulled him away.

"I don't care. Have Kari and Dwayne bring me." He said. "You go and fight that ass. He was trying to hit it up with Kari."

I stopped walking.

"I tried shutting him up…and I would've too if you were around." He said before grinding his teeth when a shock of pain went through him. "Now you're just gunna walk away. Thanks for the help."

"Ian…please stop." Kari said. "Devon wasn't doing anything to me. He just wanted to be friends."

"No Kari…Ian's right." I said cutting her off. "This is how Devon works. He always puts the charm on girls and get's them unexpectedly."

"Yup…" Ian said chuckling a little. "One minute you think you're friends and the next you end up waking in his bed after sex."

Kari gasped and slapped him.

"Ow! God fucking damnit what was that for! Damnit that hurt!" He yelled.

"You think I would fall for that?" Kari said crossing her arms. "Hmph! I'm too smart for that kind of charm."

"Whatever you say, Miss Perfect." Ian snapped back and started to laugh a little.

"Augh…can we just get him to the nurse's office so I don't have to talk to him anymore?" She whined.

"Alright, let's go." I said.

After we left Ian at the nurse's office, I sat outside the door thinking to myself.

"Hey H.A." Kari said sitting by me.

"Hey…" I said quietly.

"Are you O.K.?" She asked.

"I'm just thinking." I responded. "I mean…I could've avoided this."

"No you couldn't H.A." She said back. "How would you have known this was happening on the other side of the school?"

"I saw people running towards something. I just didn't want to get involved."

"Well…that's good. I mean think about it, H.A. What if you did help Ian out and fight Devon. You'd either be in there with him, or back in the principal's office for fighting and possibly getting kicked out of school."

"Maybe you're right, but something else bothers me." I pondered. "Why did he just let me go like that? Didn't even attempt to try and fight, or even stop me from going to a teacher. He's gunna be kicked out of school for awhile for this."

"Maybe he wanted to get you in trouble too." She said. "But, his plan didn't work cause you've gotten more patient, haven't you."

"Heh…yeah I guess." I smirked a little. "You're pretty good at this kinda stuff, Kari."

"Thanks, H.A." Kari said with a smile. "What about Ian though. You think he's gunna be alright?"

"He's tough and been through worse, trust me." I said. "That guy is the best person to have back you up in a fight. I know from experience."

"Well I better not get to witness that first hand. I don't want my friends hurt anymore." She said giving me hug unexpectedly.

"Uh…well…I'd love that too." I said hugging back. "But it's not easy when you've got me as a friend."

She sighed as she let go of me. "I thought things would've been easier since I moved here."

"Yeah…" I said quietly and felt a bit down about what she said.

"I just want things to be normal, ya know?" She continued. I started to feel a bit guilty and didn't respond.

"H.A.?" She said after a bit of silence.

"Hmm?"

"You think things will ever get normal for you?" She asked.

"Depends on what you mean by normal." I responded, standing up.

"Well…" She stood up as well. "What I meant was not having so much drama and fighting every day."

"Nope, never." I said without even thinking about it. "When you've got what I've got, there ain't ever gunna be an easy day."

"Oh…" She said quietly and looked away for a second.

"What is it…" I said.

"It's…it's nothing H.A…don't worry about it." She said a bit nervously.

"Kari…you can tell me." I said grabbing her hand.

"So you're saying that things will never change for you or your friends?" She questioned.

"Why are you asking this?" I said. "I really don't think things will get much different for me. It's always been this way for me, Ian, and Dwayne."

"I just…no I can't say it." She said letting go of my hand and walking away. My heart started to pound fast. I couldn't tell if this was going where I thought it was.

"Kari…just tell me." I said followed behind her before she stopped suddenly and turned around.

"I don't know if I can handle all this for a whole year." She said looking down.

"We'll help you through it don't worry. If Dwayne can handle it you ca-"

"No H.A." She said cutting me off. "It's more than that. After what happened to Ian…I just started thinking about when you told me you had feelings for me and...and then I thought of the dance."

"…What about the dance." I questioned. "And why does Ian getting hurt matter?"

"…I don't think I could handle being in his position." She said quietly.

"Kari what are you talking about?" I said in a slightly raised voice. "What you're saying doesn't make a bit of sense."

"I just don't know if I can say it without-"

"Kari just get on with it already!" I said loudly. "I don't know what you're trying to say here!"

"…I can't go to the dance with you." She said before closing her eyes and turning around. I just stood there without making any sound or movements. Everything just seemed to explode in my mind. This felt worse than when she turned me down yesterday. It seemed like everything I wanted was slipping away from me so fast. I just walked away. I didn't care about her reasoning or anything, but I knew Ian had something to do with it. As I walked by the nurse's office door, Dwayne came out.

"Oh man, H.A.!" Dwayne said laughing. "Me and Ian came up with the best joke ever."

I kept on walking. "Uh…H.A.? Are you there, dude? What's going on?" He said and started after me. "Dude! Say something!"

"We'd better get going or we'll be late to gym again Dwayne." I said. He stopped walking and looked around confused.

"…Did I miss something important?" He said scratching his head, but then ran after me. "Hey, man! Wait up!"

Back by the nurse's office, Kari was still standing there with her eyes closed, although small tears were falling from her face.

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**There you have it. More drama and violence. =D Hopefully the next will come sooner than this.**


	15. Chapter 15

**It's been once again a long time since I've submitted a chapter for this story. This story has really dragged it's head around for a long time now has it? I can't even remember when I first began it to be honest at this point. But enough chat, let's head back to the story.**

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"You're kidding!" Dwayne yelled to me as we walked to our next class.

"Does this look like something I would joke about?" I glanced at him.

"Sheesh, no need to be so emo about it, man." He responded.

"Shut up." I sighed and held my head down. "I'm fucking everything up somehow."

"Dude, we can fix this! I know we can." Dwayne jumped in front of me. "C'mon, let's talk to her!"

"What's the point? I won't force her to change her mind." I continued walking. Dwayne just stared and sighed.

"Never seen him this down before." He followed behind me.

Meanwhile back in the nurse's office, Kari quietly entered and sat down. Ian looked over at her.

"What's up?" He asked.

"Nothing, Ian." She said looked toward the ground.

"C'mon, now. You know I'm not the one to bullshit." He said. "Are you worried about me? I'm charmed, but I'll be just fine." He grinned.

"I told H.A. I couldn't go to the dance with him." She said bluntly. Ian's grinned quickly vanished.

"…the hell you do that for?" He said. "I know I can do stupid shit at times, but come on now, _that_ was a dumbass move Kari."

"Oh so now after all the hate you gave me for choosing him you hate me for not choosing him." She closed her eyes and sighed.

"Hey, hey. That was different." He said. "Why the change of heart anyway?"

Kari didn't respond.

"Hmm…it's the two tails isn't it…" He said quietly. Kari lifted her head up.

"W-What?" She stuttered. "No it's not that."

"Well that what is it then?" Ian said as he sat up. "Like I said, I don't do bullshit. If you don't tell me, that's what I'm thinking." He stretched.

"Come on, Ian…that's not fair." She said.

"I disagree." He responded. "Tell me why."

"I'm scared." She said very softly.

"Scared? " He said confused.

"I…I-I don't wanna talk about it." She got up and ran out of the nurse's office. Ian just stood there.

"What the fuck was that about?" He thought.

As Kari walked away from the nurse's office, she just thought to herself about what happened. "It just scares me too much to think of how I'd be treated if I really did get too close to H.A." She walked up to her locker and opened it. "I was already getting picked on a lot by hanging out with him, but if I were to actually be his girlfriend…I'd probably end up like Ian did…and I couldn't handle that."

"Watcha' thinkin' bout, miss?" Someone said behind her. She turned around and saw Devon standing there.

"Get away from me!" She said pushing him. "This is your fault!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Wha' did I do?" He said. "Was all self defense."

"Why do you want to be around me anyway?" She asked.

"I jus thought I'd try to make things up to the two-tail." He said grinning. "Ya know how he can get."

"No, I _don't_ know how he can get." Kari mumbled.

"Right, right." He snickered. "You haven't seen him really fight someone…yet."

"What does that mean!" She said startled. "Are you gunna fight him!"

"Haha, no way." He said laughing. "I hate to admit it, but that guy is actually tougher than me."

"He probably hates me now anyways…" She said quietly.

"What was that?" Devon said smiling.

"N-Nothing…" Kari mumbled.

"Nah, I think I heard ya say somethin' that sounded like music to my ears. I'll catch ya later."

"W-Wait! What are you doing!" She yelled to him as he walked away.

"Well, first I gotta make sure I don get in trouble by Tuluwitzki." He said. "Then…well you'll see." He snickered.

Kari just stood there worried. "I'm so confused by all of this…" She thought.

A few periods later, it was time for lunch once again. Dwayne was the first one to run out to the hallway, with me slowly following behind him. Dwayne saw Kari coming out of her class and quickly looked back at me.

"Uh oh…" He said looking around. "Uh…hi Kari! How was class? How's your day going?" Dwayne said quickly as he blocked her way.

"Umm…class was good I guess." She said with her head down a little. "My day could be going a little better."

"That's too bad…" He glanced back and saw me slowly walk by. I noticed pretty easily.

"Dwayne, what are you doing standing in front of that classroom?" I asked. He jumped as I asked the question.

"H.A.?" Kari said. My ears perked up, but not for long. Dwayne got out of the way.

"…hi…" I mumbled and kept walking without looking.

Kari just sighed. Dwayne didn't say anything. "I guess he told you didn't he Dwayne."

"Yeah, he did." Dwayne said scratching the back of his head. "Probably a bad idea to ask why?"

"I guess I could talk to you about it. Ian was giving me a hard time…I'm just afraid…" She said looking down.

"Afraid?" Dwayne said confused. "Afraid of what? H.A. is an awesome dude. Plus he's head over heels for you. He's not the kind of guy to do anything frightening to you."

"Ohhh…Ian was right." She said frustrated as she sat down by the classroom wall.

"Umm…Kari? Hello?" Dwayne said. "You're leaving me in the dust here man. I don't know what you're talking about."

"…it _is_ the tails that bother me..." She said quietly. Dwayne scratched his head again.

"Well that came out of left field." Dwayne commented. "Umm…well…I…god I'm bad at this kinda stuff…umm…I thought they didn't bother you."

"It's not _them_ it's what happens because of them." She replied. "What happened to Ian was because H.A.'s an outcast at the school…and I'm already being cast aside for being friends with him. If I went to the dance and even went further after that with him…I don't think I could handle that."

"I've never been beaten up like Ian has. I don't think you would either." Dwayne said. Kari just glared at him. "Uh…sorry…"

"That's not what I meant Dwayne…just in general." She held her head. "It's only the third day of school and I already feel like I'm all alone."

"But things will get better!" Dwayne said trying to cheer her up. "I've only known H.A. for a little awhile, and things haven't gotten bad for us. We stick up for each other. We've got your back Kari. H.A. is a dude who would do anything to protect you. What happened with Ian won't happen again, I'm sure H.A. can promise that."

Kari just looked at the floor for a few minutes thinking to herself.

"…Kari?" Dwayne asked.

"I've gotta go..." She said getting up. "Thanks for letting me talk to you Dwayne."

"We're done already?" He said. "I thought this stuff took more time to talk about."

Kari let out a small smile. "You've made your point already. I think I need to talk to H.A. again."

Dwayne's eyes opened wide. "You mean you're gunna?"

"…Yes…I will let him know the dance is back on." She said nodding. Dwayne jumped up and down.

"Alright!" He shouted. "It's back on! Awesome awesome!"

"Geeze, you get more excited than H.A. does." She said.

"That's just who I am man." Dwayne said. "That's just who I am. Now let's get some lunch, I'm starving here."

"For once I agree with you on that." She said with a chuckle.

As the two headed towards the lunch room, I was standing there by the door.

"What were you guys talking about?" I asked with my arms crossed.

"Well…you dude I guess." Dwayne said. I rolled my eyes.

"I guess I should've known that." I replied.

"H.A…I need to tell you something." Kari said walking closer to me.

"What's that…the fact that something I did is screwing everything about us up?" I said a little frustrated.

Kari held her head down at the response. "…No it's-"

"Or maybe something about me personally?" I interrupted. "You shot me down with no reasoning thrown in the air at all."

"H.A. I'm sorry but-"

"Look I get it. You want nothing to do with me. I don't need the pity talk now." I said once again interrupting her.

"Dude just let her talk!" Dwayne said intervening. "She has _good _news." I raised an eyebrow.

"Hmm?" I said and was quickly hugged tightly by Kari.

"I'm so sorry for doing that to you back there H.A." She said. "I was just scared about things, but Dwayne helped me clear my head. I've decided I want to go to the dance with you still."

My face brightened up the instant I heard her say that. It was the best thing I could have ever heard. "…You really mean it?"

"Do I look like I'm lying H.A.?" She said. "I'm essentially attached to you right now."

"Well it's just you've been so back and forth with me and stuff…" I said chuckling.

"Don't ruin the moment for me." She replied letting go of me. "Do you forgive me?"

I took a deep breath. "I couldn't stay mad at you for very long."

"Aww you guys already look like a couple." Dwayne said.

"We're not a couple!" Kari and I said at the same time towards Dwayne and then we looked at each other.

"What was that?" Dwayne asked. "I don't think I heard you guys clearly."

"Just go get your lunches, Mister 'I eat three lunches every day.'" I said back at him.

"Alright dude, I'll stop. Food here I come." Dwayne said walking into the lunch room.

"Oh and Dwayne?" I said as he turned around. "Thanks man."

He smirked and put his thumb up. "Consider it paying you back for yesterday dude. Later."

"He's so weird sometimes." I shook my head. "What did he even say to you?" I asked.

"He just reminded me why I hang out with you guys in the first place." Kari said but she paused. "…H.A."

"Yeah?"

"If I ever got into trouble you'd help me right?" She asked.

"Of course. You know I'd do anything for you." I said bowing. "I'm your humble servant…for now…"

"Oh? And what's that supposed to mean?" She said with a smile.

"Well right now I'm just your servant." I replied. "Maybe with time I could be your King."

"Are you already trying to ask me out again, H.A.?" She said sticking her tongue at me.

"Hey hey. Be nice." I said. "C'mon. Let's go get some food. Dwayne's waiting for us."

"I agree with that." She said as she grabbed my hand. I was surprised by that, but shook off the feeling as we headed toward the lunch room. I finally felt like all the loose ends have been fixed between our group.

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**And there we have it. Chapter 15 is finished. The first half of this chapter was finished for the longest time, but writers block put it off for awhile, which in the end had me forget all about it, and I recently sat down and finished it up.**


	16. Chapter 16

**Would you look at that? I new chapter has been released and it hasn't been a year! Well...the last one was last year, but that doesn't count. Anyways, on to the story!**

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The final bell of the day had rung, and I headed out of the school on a high note for a change. Kari and Ian were no longer at each other's throats anymore, and me and her could finally go to the dance in peace. I stopped in the hall and paused. I actually felt a little nervous about the dance. I've never been much for social interaction at my school, so this was a big change of pace for me, regardless of the fact I was going with the girl I liked. Things needed to go well if I wanted any shot at having Kari be my girlfriend, but I was already thinking ahead of myself.

"I just need to take this slow." I said to myself. "Everything will be fine. It's just a little dance. Me and Kari will have a good time. There's nothing to be nervous about."

"Feeling worried about the dance, dude?" Dwayne said from behind me which caused me to jump.

"Jesus Dwayne!" I said startled. "Way to creep up on a guy."

"You were just standing here in the middle of the hallway, dude." He said. "It's not like this is a place for privacy."

"Point taken." I sighed. "How's Ian doing? I haven't seen him since before lunch."

"All patched up and ready to know what the fuck's going on around here." Ian said from behind me, which I again was startled by.

"What the hell! Is it 'Scare the shit out of H.A.' day!" I yelled.

"Cut to the chase. What's going on between you and Kari?" He said sternly.

"Oh!" I said quickly. "I guess no one's told you yet. Everything's all back to normal now."

Ian just raised an eyebrow. "Well that didn't take very long…"

"What's that supposed to mean?" I looked at him confused.

"Kari was just all messed up over _something _about you." He continued. "Ran off before I could get a word in."

"Don't worry about dude!" Dwayne said patting him on the back, which made Ian wince in pain a little and he gave Dwayne a dirty look. "I fixed everything up myself."

"You?" Ian chuckled as he yanked Dwayne's arm off of him. "No offense, but you're not much of a relationship expert, man."

"It's not like me and Kari are in any sort of relationship anyway." I scolded. "We're just _friends._" I emphasized heavily on the word "friends." Perhaps a bit too heavily.

"Either way, what could dummy little Dwayne here know about fixing something like this?"

"Hey, I'm the one with the girl dude. Not you." Dwayne smirked at his own comeback.

"Touché…" Ian said quietly and cleared his throat. "So, are we gunna leave this friggin' school already or just stand here like idiots?"

"Whatever. You guys are the ones holding me up." I stretched and continued walking.

"Guys!" Kari said from a distance. "Guys, wait up!" Dwayne and I stopped and turned around.

"Sorry, I guess we forgot about you." Ian said still walking and laughed a little. It didn't take long for Kari to catch up and whack him in the back of the head.

"Ow!" He yelled. "Jesus! Ya know…I'm still recovering!"

"Doesn't mean you didn't deserve it." She said and turned to me. "So, H.A., are you ready for the dance tonight?"

"I guess…" I said rubbing the back of my head. "I mean…I don't know what to wear or anything."

"It's just a back to school dance, silly." She said. "It's all casual. Don't you even listen to the announcements?"

"Of course!" I replied. "Um…most of the time…sometimes."

"…H.A…" She glanced at me. "Whatever. The point is, just go with whatever you want. No need to be fancy."

"Right right." I said. "I got it."

"What about you guys?" She asked Dwayne and Ian. "Are you going?"

"I don't see why I can't tag along." Dwayne said. "Doesn't matter if I don't got a date. It'll still be fun."

"Great!" She said. "Ian?"

"I don't know…" He pondered and put his hands up in the air like a balancing scale. "T.V. and video games…or boring dance…the decision is just too difficult."

"Ian…" She sighed.

"Whatever you want Ian." I said laughing.

"Seriously H.A.?" Kari said. "He'd rather do that than hang out with friends?"

"It's _Ian, _Kari." I stated.

"…." She didn't respond, and decided to just leave it.

"You're so serious about everything." Ian laughed. "Ah, what the fuck, I'll tag along. H.A. might need some help breaking up fights."

"Okay, one, do you see what you look like?" I said. "You're a bit beat up after your little 'chat' with Devon, and second, I'm _not_ getting into anymore drama."

"Didn't you say that yesterday, dude?" Dwayne asked.

"Not the point Dwayne." I said. "This'll be just a simple thing. Plus, anymore fighting and Kari would probably kill me."

She chuckled. Ian just rolled his eyes. "Whatever you say man." He said. "Let's kick that dance's ass."

"Or we could just have fun." I bumped his fist as he and Dwayne both got on the bus. Before I could get on the bus myself, Kari stopped me.

"Wait a second H.A." She said. "I wanted to talk to you alone quick."

"What is it, Kari?" I asked.

"I just wanted to say I'm really sorry for everything." She began. "You probably think I'm bi-polar or something with the way I've been acting."

I sighed. She had a point. The way things had gone this year definitely were all over the place. Still, I felt optimistic. "I know you didn't mean for anything to happen, Kari." I said. "Sometimes stuff happens, but it's all over now. We're all good."

"I know…but I still feel really guilty."

"Kari, relax." I said putting my hand on her shoulder. "I've got tough skin, for obvious reasons. It takes a lot to get to me, especially from one of my friends."

She smiled. "Okay H.A."

"Now get to your bus." I said. "You don't wanna miss it." She nodded.

"I'll see you at the dance tonight okay?" She said.

"Of course. It'll be a lot of fun." I said waving to her. "See ya later."

"See ya H.A." She said back. I jumped on the bus and took my seat by Ian and Dwayne as we headed home for the afternoon. After saying my good byes to the guys I headed back to my house and relax for a minute, but was quickly interrupted by my mom as Shawn saw the look on her face and fled to his room.

"I received a call from Principal Tuluwitzski today." She scolded. I sighed without a reply.

"H.A. how many times do I need to talk to you about all these fights? It's only the second day of school for crying out loud." She rubbed her eyes in frustration. "I know that what you're going through is tough and all, but you really need to take the high road in situations, H.A."

I glared at her after that statement, as I didn't take too kindly to it. "You mean ignoring it and letting the kids walk all over me?" I said and leaned against the wall by the door. "Yeah…that'll work out swell."

"Don't get smart with me." She snapped. "I could easily have you grounded you know."

"…" I didn't dare speak back in a negative tone. There's a chance she could take the dance away from me after all. I sighed. "…What I'm trying to say is…I need to stand my ground or else everyone all over the school would take advantage. Even if only some kids are scared of me it gives me some relief at least."

"That's no excuse for this fight, H.A." She responded. "The Principal told me who you got into a fight with." I glanced away from her for a second. "Is everything O.K. with your friends?"

"Oh definitely." I said standing up straight and looked back at her. "There's no way I'd hold a grudge against one of those guys."

"You're sure?" She questioned.

"I would never lie about something like this, mom." I said. "…Am I going to be grounded for this?"

"…No, not this time." She replied. "But…anything else like this and you can kiss all of your stuff good bye."

"I know, I know." I said. "I promise I won't get into any more fights."

"How many times have I heard that one." She said rolling her eyes and walked away. "…I'll never understand boys and their fighting…" She continued to ramble on the subject as she walked into the kitchen. I just let out a sigh of relief and headed to my room. I threw on my headphones for some music and just relaxed. My mind started wondering and I was soon thinking about my dad for some reason. Where did he go after he left the other day? He has to do _something_ when he's not around to trying to make my life a living hell. I fell on my bed and closed my eyes. Maybe he just lives in some beat up apartment or something. Probably goes around with a million other girls even though he's still technically with my mom and is about to have a third kid in his family. That wouldn't surprise me one bit though. I clenched my fist in frustration. Maybe I should stop thinking about him since it's obviously getting me mad.

I decided to start thinking about the dance again. Kari says it's not a big deal, but to me it is. There's so much pressure in having a perfect night for her, but I still needed to just relax and have a good time. If things don't go right, Kari would probably push me away again. She already had once and I don't even know the reason why. My eyes shot open and I sat up.

"Wait…" I said out loud to myself. Why _did _she flip flop like that? I never actually learned the reason. She just talked to Dwayne and boom, everything's okay again. What did he even say to her? All this discussion about me and I don't even know a single word about it. I gotta ask her about it as soon as I see her tonight…but I couldn't. It'd probably cause some unnecessary drama again.

"Ug…this is frustrating." I said rubbing my face. "I just don't know what to do." Suddenly, I got a text, and it just happened to be from Kari.

"Hey H.A., I'm gunna show up at your house around 5 ok? I hope we have fun! =)" I read the text to myself and thought. Should I ask her now? No, that would be stupid. This is something you need to talk in person about.

"That's fine. See you then." I replied and sent the text. I decided it's better to forget about it and figure it all out later. Right now I was in the mood for a snack and headed for the kitchen. On the way there I bumped into a Shawn, who was walking around playing some game.

"Easy! Watch where you're going." I said. "I nearly tripped over you."

"Me? You made me lose a life!" He replied looking angry at me.

"I bet I could make you lose another one if you keep that attitude with me."

"Errr…fine." He started talking in an overly sarcastic tone. "Oh, excuse me big brother! I didn't mean to bump into you accidentally and ruin your whole day!"

I rubbed the back of my head in frustration. "Someday you're gunna get yourself in some serious trouble with that crappy tone of yours. And don't expect me to help you when you do."

"Pfft…what's gunna happen? I don't play around with gangs like you do." He started playing his game again and walked away.

I slapped my forehead. "I did not do anything-ug…it's no use. Whatever. It was nice chatting with you, Shawn." I sighed and continued toward the kitchen. Once I grabbed my snack and noticed it was getting around 4:00 I decided to take a quick shower before Kari got here. Getting a chance to shower in peace and not needing to race against the clock was not a common occurrence for me, and I took full advantage of that.

After a relaxing shower I headed toward my room and looked through my drawers at what to wear. Kari did say it was casual, but I wanted to wear something at least a _little_ bit different than normal. I didn't think a simple, plain long-sleeve shirt would hurt over my usual T-shirt and jacket attire. After all it wasn't that cold outside and I still put on a pair of my usual khaki pants. I grabbed my phone and anything else I needed with me and after quickly fixing up my hair so it wasn't a mess I waited out in the living room for Kari to arrive.

"Are you nervous?" I heard my mom ask.

"Me? Nah." I replied. "It's just a simple dance, ya know? What could possibly happen that would go wrong?"

"You can't lie to me, H.A. I'm your mother." She crossed her arms with a smirk.

"Eh…alright, alright." I sighed. "Maybe a little nervous but you can't blame me."

"I'm not making fun of you…I'm actually proud of you for doing this." She said quietly. Those words I did not expect to come out of her mouth. "You've always been up to no good…getting in fights all the time and never did much socially."

"Yeah, I know." I sighed.

"I'm just glad you're doing something with the school for a change." She continued.

"You can thank Kari for that." I chuckled. "There's no way I'd be doing this thing otherwise."

"She's definitely a perfect match for you." She said with a bit of flower in her voice.

"Aaaand you ruined the moment." I rolled my eyes, even though secretly I agreed with what she said. Suddenly, I heard a knock on the door.

"That must be her." I said as I got the door. Upon opening it I was greeted by Kari, wearing a yellow tube top and a pair of skinny jeans. She had her hair done up a little bit too, but her pink bangs were still showing.

"A tube top?" I smirked. "I thought this was casual."

"Hello to you too H.A." She scuffed. "What's so formal about a tube top?"

"I'm just kidding." I laughed. "I'll see you later, mom."

"I hope to see you back tonight, H.A." She demanded. "I don't want anything later than 11 o'clock. Okay?"

"Sure thing." I said quickly as I headed out the door with Kari. As we walked toward the car, a thought occurred to me.

"Um...Kari…do your parents still think we're…you know…boyfriend and girlfriend and all that?" I said a little unsure.

"Oh…well, I sorta told them the truth about us being regular friends yesterday." She said. "I don't think they were very happy I lied, but I think once they meet you they'll forget all about the whole thing."

"I'm assuming you speak highly of me." I smiled.

"Of course H.A." She smiled back at me. "You're a great friend to have."

I blushed a little bit. "Heh…thanks."

We climbed into the back of her parent's car and headed off toward the school. Her dad glanced at me through his rear view mirror and her mother turned around to look at me. Her dad wasn't as big as I had originally pictured. He was wearing a suit which led me to believe he was an office worker or something along those lines. Her mother was your typically happy looking mom. You know the ones that were always so nosey to their kids and tried to be a part of everything they did. I honestly felt a little bit awkward with them looking at me the way they were.

"Um…hi…" I said quietly.

"Hi! You must be H.A." Her mom said with a rather perky voice. "Kari's told us all about you. You seem to be a very nice, confident, young man!"

"Uh, thanks." I replied with a small smile.

"You don't need to be nervous around me, hun. I won't bite." She said. I just looked over at Kari. She turned her head slightly toward me with a look of embarrassment. I tried not to chuckle at her face, but I sort of failed. Her look turned into an evil glare pretty quickly which made my chuckle go away immediately.

"So H.A." Her dad spoke up. He had a much more intimidating voice than his appearance gave him credit for. "You're not a trouble maker are ya?"

I looked over at Kari again and she just shrugged. I cleared my throat and started to speak.

"Well…no I don't try looking for trouble or anything…" I paused. "Trouble seems to come finding me though…"

"What do you mean by that?" He questioned.

"I just…get picked on a little bit." I began. "You know…high school and all."

"You look too tough to be a guy who gets picked on if you ask me." He said. "Don't tell me you're too scared to stand up for yourself."

"Honey, you don't need to be so blunt with the questions." Her mom whispered, but I could still hear her pretty easily.

"I'm just trying to get to know him a little better, that's all." He stated.

"No no…it's not that I'm scared over anything...um…" I looked over at Kari one more time for some reassurance. She mouthed 'what do you want me to do?' toward me so I cleared my throat once again. "Kids have their…uh…reasons for picking on me…I think." I wanted to slap myself in the face for saying that.

"What reasons could there be? You seem like a pretty fine boy to me." He said.

"Well…" I gulped. "It's all about my…my tails."

"Tails?" Both Kari's parents said with surprise at the same time, which made my face turned really red. Kari finally decided to speak up.

"Mom! Dad! You're embarrassing him!" She yelled. "…No more questions about him…please?" There was a short pause.

"Alright, Kari." Her mom replied. "We're sorry. We didn't mean to make him feel uncomfortable."

She sighed. "Thank you." I gave a breath of relief myself and felt Kari grab my hand. "I am so sorry." She whispered.

"Eh…better to have nosey parents than ones that don't care right?" I replied, equally as quiet. It wasn't much longer before we reached the school and her parents let us out of the car.

"Have fun you two! Don't go too crazy!" Her mom said excitedly. Her dad just smiled at me.

"Don't worry about us, we'll be fine!" Kari said trying to shoo them away.

"Alright, we'll leave you two alone." She said before getting back in the car. Her father just waved without a word as they headed off.

"I am so so SO sorry about my parents." She said as we walked into the school. "I didn't think they'd be so…well…so nosey."

"It wasn't that bad…so you never told them about my tails?" I pointed out.

"I know…I'm sorry. I'm sure they're gunna give me hell about it tonight."

"…Why?" I said puzzled.

"Oh!" She said startled. "It's nothing like that H.A.! They won't have a problem with you I promise! It's probably an important thing to talk about when you originally called the person your 'boyfriend.'"

"I did notice your dad didn't say much once we got to the school. He was awfully talkative in the car though."

"Let's not worry about that right now H.A." She pushed me toward the school. "We've got a dance to attend!"

I looked around the high school gym and saw all the decorations that were up. There were streamers and balloons of all colors everywhere. The hottest dance song on the radio was playing from the DJ Station in the corner of the room, which was filling up with kids very quickly. Surprisingly, none of them turned around to even say a word to me. On the other side of the room was the refreshment table which was already being hoarded with random guys without dates.

"Looks fun, doesn't it?" Kari said to me.

"Yeah…I think it might be." I replied with a small smile.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" She said grabbing my arm and forcing me inside. "I wanna have some fun!"

I guess I didn't have a choice on the matter. For some reason my nervousness seemed to have gone away at that point. Maybe I was going to have a great time at the dance after all.

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**A chapter with no drama in it? That's crazy talk! It's supposed to be all drama all the time! =P Well, hope you enjoyed this chapter, because even though it didn't end in a cliff hanger, I'm leaving you with one right now. Something is definitely gunna be happening at the dance, but I'm not telling...yet. =P  
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	17. Chapter 17

**Big news! Updates are definitely going to be coming on a weekly basis on this again. Don't believe me? I'm currently working on chapter 19 right now. Yeah, that's right. I just uploaded chapter 17 and I'm working on chapter 19. It feels nice to be back on this again with consistency. Updates should be going up every Sunday, and I'm hoping I can get some of my readers back in the process. Please leave a review if you like it, or even if you don't like it. Criticism is always welcome. =D**

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I didn't say much when we first walked around the gym. Kari looked at me with a smile, so I simply smiled back.

"So what do you wanna do first?" She asked with excitement. I looked around without an answer. I hadn't a clue of what went on during a school dance besides…well dancing. I was hoping she'd suggest something to me first. There was a long pause before she spoke up.

"…Are you nervous H.A.?" She stuck her tongue at me. My eyes darted to the side and I let out an embarrassed smile.

"Eh heh…what gave that away?" I said shyly and shuffled my feet.

"Well, you're not being very talkative so far." She responded and grabbed my hand. "Come on! There's so much to do here!"

"I guess…but I really don't know what we can do." I rubbed the back of my head with my free hand.

"I thought so much." She said looking into my eyes. She grabbed my other hand and pulled me a little closer to her.

"W-What are you doing?" I stuttered and hadn't realized we started moving.

"What do you think we're doing?" She giggled. "We're dancing."

I looked down and my eyes opened wide when I saw that my feet were moving along with hers. In fact, my whole body was moving with sync with her. Holy shit! I was actually dancing! I looked back up to her.

"Wow…I didn't think it was that easy." I laughed a little bit.

"You're a natural, H.A." She said. I don't think I've smiled bigger than I had at that moment. Kari was right all along. I was having the time of my life and we've only been here for five minutes. I was dancing and miraculously I wasn't looking like an idiot while doing it. However, something else backed in to my mind for the moment. I had noticed that no one had even given me a look so far. The place had to be loaded with kids from the school, too. It actually confused me more than anything else.

"Are you alright, H.A.?" Kari asked me. I snapped out of my little world when she spoke.

"Hmm? Yeah, I'm fine."

"You seemed to space out there for a second." She said. "What were you thinking about?"

"…Nothing really." I lied. "I just feel comfortable around you, that's all."

"Aww, well aren't you cute." She smiled. "Do you wanna take a break?"

"I guess we could." I nodded. "Maybe we could spot Dwayne or Ian."

"Good idea." She agreed.

"And maybe we could get those two to dance." I chuckled.

She laughed. "That would be _so_ awesome!" We headed over towards the refreshments area, thinking that's the first place Dwayne would be found, and we were spot on with the assumption. He was wearing a tuxedo T-shirt, and looked like he didn't do much else to get ready for the dance besides that.

"Why are you always by the food, Dwayne?" I asked. He shrugged his shoulders. I let out a pity laugh. "Have you seen Ian?"

"Not yet, man." He said. "How have you guys been so far?"

"Well, I found out H.A. is a really good dancer." Kari said. Dwayne smirked. I groaned, awaiting his response.

"Oh really now?" He said in an overly cheerful tone. My face started to get a little red with embarrassment. "Didn't expect that out of you H.A."

"Just eat your food and enjoy your date with Ian." I said back. "It looks like you're gunna be stood up though. That's a shame, man." Kari just started laughing.

"Alright, alright. I'll be nice." He responded and pounded my fist. "Props on the comeback too." I looked around once again and got closer to Dwayne.

"So…have you noticed anything strange so far?" I said quietly so that only he could hear.

"Whadda you mean?"

"Not one person has said anything to me negatively since I got here." I responded. "I was expecting an army of insults or something." Dwayne looked toward the crowd of people.

"I dunno what to tell you man." He said. "Maybe you should just enjoy yourself. I know I am." He grabbed a pig in a blanket off of a tray and tossed it in his mouth.

"How the hell are you not fat?" I asked, giving him an odd look.

"No idea, but I ain't complaining." He responded.

"Well…let me know if you see Ian. Although I'm not expecting any miracles."

"Will do, captain." He said giving me a salute as we walked away.

"You don't think Ian is still upset about me going to the dance with you over him, do you?" Kari asked. I stretched my arms over my head.

"I dunno…" I replied and thought for a second. "He's a tough guy to read. Some days he's a jackass in the good kind of way, and other days he's the bad kind."

"Well…I really hope he shows up." She said. "He could have a lot of fun here. I know you found that out."

I smiled again. "Yeah, that's true." I looked at Kari and grabbed her hand.

"Oh, so now you're going to lead?" She asked.

"What? Oh…I didn't know that-I mean…" I stuttered all over whatever I was trying to say. Kari laughed.

"Relax H.A." She said as I was pulled closer to her. "I know this is a new experience for you."

Dwayne was watching us dance from the distance. He drank another glass of punch and kept a close eye for Ian if he were to arrive.

"Man, I wish Trish was here." He said to himself. "This isn't as fun as I thought." Dwayne walked away from the refreshments and glanced around through the crowds of people. He thought he saw a familiar tall blue fox for a second and shook his head.

"No way…" He muttered. "There's no way Devon came here…"

He walked a little closer to the area where he saw him, and sure enough, Devon was there.

"Oh man…I better tell H.A." He turned around but lost me in the crowd. "…Crud."

As we continued to dance, Kari rested her head against my chest. I took a deep breath. It wasn't a frustrated sigh or anything. I was happy…I think. I was dancing with the girl I loved. You can't get much better than that, right? But my mind was fighting a battle with itself; between letting things play out, or make a move myself. I could picture myself kissing her right then and there on the dance floor. It'd be the perfect time to do so, too.

As Kari held on to me tightly, I looked up at the ceiling and sighed. I couldn't do that. I've learned the hard way that moving in on something this delicate would backfire. If I were to kiss her right now, I'd probably blow my chances with her completely. I still felt like I needed to do _something_ to show how much I cared for her, without coming off too strong of course.

"H.A." She said to me quietly.

"Hmm?"

"…I'm sorry." She kept her head close to my chest. It wasn't particular a response I was expecting, but I was curious to know what it was about.

"What are you sorry for?" I asked. "We're having a good time. That's what you wanted right?"

"I'm making things so complicated for you." She said quietly and pulled her head up and looked at me. I could have sworn she had water building in her eyes. "You were right before…I'm giving off so many mixed signals."

I pulled her close and gave her a hug. "Hey, don't worry about all that. Let's just try to have fun." I looked at her. "It's what you told me to do, right?"

She gave me a small smile but it quickly disappeared. "…I still need to tell you something." My heart started to beat a little faster as I waited in suspense about her answer.

"…What's that?"

"The reason I changed my mind about the dance before." She began. "I felt…well…I mean…I'm just…afraid." She looked down at the ground. I walked us over to the side and sat her down to talk about this. I didn't have a clue where this was going, but I was hoping nowhere bad.

"I'm not quite following." I said. "What could you be afraid of?"

She didn't have the heart to response, so she directed her eyes toward my tails before hanging her head again. I didn't know exactly how to take this. All I knew was all the happy feelings I had at the dance were sucked away pretty quickly. There was, however, a feeling of disappointment and frustration taking over me. I let out a loud sigh and sat down next to her.

"Is this what you talked to Dwayne about before?" I asked. All Kari did was nod her head. There was no way I was letting my tails get in the way of something again. I was going to get to the bottom of this right there.

"It's just a couple of tails." I said, trying to contain any frustration. "You said it yourself; they're not a big deal if you don't make them out to be."

"I know…" She sighed. "But the dance…everything is going so perfect, and it's all because people are leaving us alone." A feeling suddenly of anger came over me.

"Are you friggin' kidding me?" I said in a slightly raised voice. She lifted her head up, obviously shocked by my response.

"You think it's all _them_ that control how happy I am?" I pointed towards the crowd. "That…if they don't do anything to me I'm happy, but if they do, I'm all of a sudden going to be emo or so shit? Are you even hearing what you're saying?"

She didn't respond as she knew she definitely hit a touchy subject with me. She was going to let me rant away and put her head down again.

"Please Kari…look at me." I was almost tempted to grab her head and force her to look at me, but she did as I asked. "I can be happy no matter what they do. And if they do get to me, well it happens sometimes. I can't avoid that. Don't worry about me, I'm fine. It's _you_ I'm worried about."

"I'm sorry…"

"Stop apologizing!" I rubbed the hair on my head in frustration. I knew this was going to happen if we got on the subject. I leaned back in my chair and took a deep breath. "Listen…I can tell you're having trouble adjusting to…well this." I went to grab her hand, but she didn't seem to want to accept it and keep looking down. "I'm honestly running out of things to say to help you out here."

It was starting to get really bad. If she was having trouble adjusting to our circle of friends, how could she _ever_ want to date me? I was almost starting to give up on it.

"Well well well!" I heard a familiar voice speak up. "It seems someone is havin' a bit a girl trouble!" I looked up, and saw Devon standing there.

"You've got to fucking kidding me." I said with frustration. Kari looked up without a word. "What the hell are you doing here Devon?"

"Hey, ain't we all invited to the dance?" He said with a smirk.

"What the hell do you want then?" I stood up since I wasn't going to let him walk all over me, especially in the mood I was in. He ignored me and looked over toward Kari.

"This guy givin' ya trouble?" He questioned. To my surprise, she actually nodded her head slowly.

"…Kari…" I said, feeling my chest get heavy.

"Face it man." He said with a chuckle. "Your little dream world won't work with those tails of yours."

I clenched my fist. "I can't get into another fight. I can't get into another fight…" I said to myself over and over. I thought of the first response that came to my head.

"So what if things don't work out." I said getting into his face. "It's not the end of the world; I think I'll be able to manage." Kari's eyes bolted open and she looked at me.

"W-What did you say?" Kari asked. Devon didn't intervene and watched with a smirk on his face.

"You heard me…" I left my back to her. "If you don't think you can handle any of this…well…don't stick with this circle then. I won't stop you."

Kari couldn't believe what she was hearing. I wasn't going to stop her if she decided it was too much to stay friends with us. She thought for a minute. Did she really want to lose her new friends just like that? All she could think about was how I'd feel if she went through giving up. She bit her bottom lip and spoke up.

"But… I want our friendship to work." She said quietly as I turned around. "I don't want to be afraid of being an outcast anymore. I wanna try and make it work." I looked back at Devon, who obviously didn't look too happy about that response.

"Fine!" He said. "You wanna be an outcast ya dumb bitch, go right on ahead! But let me show ya what can happen to yer friends!" He went to take a shot at me, but his fist was held back by someone.

"Ian!" I said with delighted surprise.

"How about we _don't_ cause a scene at the first dance of the year?" Ian said. "Although you can continue if you want…and get expelled." Devon looked around at all of us and pulled his hand away from Ian.

"I'm outta here." He said walking away. "You people are fucked up."

"So…" Ian began. "What the fuck is going on here? When Dwayne told me about Devon he said you two were having a great time."

"When did you get here?" I asked but he cut me off.

"Answer my question first. I'm curious."

"Just a little bit of realizations." I said tilting my head toward Kari. "I think we've got things pretty much under wraps though."

"Then why does she look like she's caught the emo?" Ian gave me a glare. Kari stood up.

"I'm fine Ian." She said. "I'm glad you could be here."

"Umm…okay." He said confused. "You're sure you're good?"

She nodded. "Can I speak with H.A. alone for a bit?"

Ian glanced at me with a suspicious look in his eyes. "Fine. I'll be hanging out with Dwayne." He walked away, leaving me and Kari alone once again. Neither of us spoke for a moment. To be honest, I didn't know what to say. With what happened in the past fifteen minutes, what was I supposed to say?

"…Were you really going to let me let go?" Kari said. I sat down next to her and sighed.

"You're struggling to fit in to our group."

"But…your feelings toward me…" She leaned on my shoulder.

"They're not going anyway…but what's the point if you're not happy?" I put my arm around her, which I hoped wasn't getting too close to her. She didn't seem to mind it.

"I promise you H.A...I'll keep trying to adjust to this. And when I finally do…" She rubbed my hand gently then grabbed it. "Maybe we could try being more than friends."

My heart skipped a beat as I held her hand tightly. I looked her in the eyes and fixed her bangs. "I'm glad we sorted this all out. Although I wish we could've done it in a bit more of a private place."

She let out a small chuckle and stood up. "I'll be right back; I'm gotta use the bathroom."

"Alright. I'm gunna go find Ian and Dwayne. If they're dancing I'll make sure to record a video for you." I grinned. She let out another chuckle and walked away. I let out a sigh of relief, stretched, and closed my eyes. I needed a little bit of relaxing after that.

"Damn H.A., you sure got lucky back there." I said to myself. "Just when you think things are fine, another thing blows up in your face."

"So, how'd your talk go?" I opened one eye and saw Ian sitting next to me.

"Better than expected, I suppose." I said. "I'm honestly starting to believe she's actually bi-polar. One minute she's happy, then BOOM! An explosion of second guesses, feeling sad for no reason, and plenty of excuses to back it up."

"That's a pretty dick thing to say. I hope you don't actually believe that." Ian commented.

"Sheesh!" I said. "I didn't expect you to be my conscience. I'm a little frustrated that's all."

"Of what? You not being able to make-out with her yet?" He grinned at me. I glared back. Ian's tone wasn't helping my mood very much.

"Give me a break. You know that's not what I'm talking about." I sat up. "I'm putting 100% effort into trying to make things work, and she always does something to mess with it."

"Why the hell do you like her then?" He asked. I didn't respond so quickly to that question. "Was it honestly because you thought she didn't think twice about your tails? That sounds a bit desperate if you ask me." I clenched my fist and looked down.

"Shut up, Ian…that's not it at all. Besides…if you can't tell, she _does_ have a problem with them."

"And now we're back to square one. You're frustrated she's messing things up, and we know the reason." I turned around and grabbed his shirt.

"Shut…the fuck…up." I stared him in the eyes. "I've been through enough bullshit tonight. I don't need you making things any more fucking difficult."

"Hey, I'm not trying to be a dick, honest." He pulled my hands off of him. "I'm talking to you, friend to friend, about something serious here. I don't want her fucking with you anymore either."

"She said she'll work on it…" I said quietly. Ian shook his head.

"Alright, fine." He stood up. "So things are all of a sudden all better?"

"…She promised…"

"People break promises all the time." He said, cutting me off. I stood up and looked him dead in the eyes.

"No! She promised to give me a chance if we get through all the bullshit."

He looked at me with an odd glance. "You're talking…dating chance, right? I am I understanding properly?"

"Yes. That's exactly what she told me." I responded. I was really hoping Ian would understand what I was trying to do. I wanted so badly for Kari to work things out.

"…You're fucking kidding." He said shaking his head again. "All she did was promise you something you don't even know is gunna happen, and now you say you two are fine?"

"Don't put words in my mouth! I never said we were fine." I pushed him. "I'll be okay, alright? I don't need your lectures."

"…Fine whatever." He said walking away. "I was trying to help you out, but I see you don't want it."

"Pissing me off isn't helping me, you asshole." I stood there looking at him.

"You're an idiot, H.A." He said under his breath so I couldn't hear.

"So much for relaxing." I sat back down in the chair and leaned back. All I wanted was to clear my head out a little before Kari got back from the bathroom. I contemplated telling her my conversation with Ian, but with how sensitive she seemed to be that night, I decided against it. I closed my eyes again and let out a long sigh.

Ten minutes had to have passed since my conflict with Ian and Kari still wasn't back. I didn't think anything of it, since I knew girls always took an hour to go to the bathroom, but for some reason I felt a bit worried. Maybe she used that as an excuse to leave? No, there's no way she would ditch me. I got up and headed for the girl's bathroom and saw what was taking so long; she was still in line. I walked up to her and noticed her shuffling around a little bit.

"Long line?" I said with a chuckle.

"It's not funny H.A." She leaned on one leg. "I've been standing here for like twenty minutes and I'm still not even close."

I could easily read her body language, and knew she was getting pretty desperate. I looked around and saw that the men's bathroom completely empty. I didn't know if she would go for it, but I threw out the idea anyway.

"How about I sneak you into the men's room?" I asked quietly. "There's no one in there, and I'll keep guard in case someone tries to get in."

"…" She bounced her legs a bit. "You're sure no one would see me go in?"

"I'll make sure of it." I said. She nodded and got out of line for the girl's room. As we walked toward the men's room I kept close eye on anyone who happened to be looking in our direction. I looked inside to see if anyone was in there, and when I thought the coast was clear outside, I signaled to her.

"Quick! Go in!" I said quietly. She looked at me before heading inside.

"Thanks a ton, H.A." She said giving me a hug and ran in. I leaned by the door as promised and made sure no one else would head in.

"Outta the way, freak." A random hedgehog said walking up to me.

"It's out of order."

"Then where's the 'out of order' sign?" He asked. I shrugged.

"I dunno. Probably missing."

"I'm not believing you." He tried opening the door and I grabbed his arm. "What the hell's wrong with you?"

"You wanna start something?" I looked him in the eyes. "Go take a piss outside if you have to."

"…" He walked away, obviously not wanting to get into a fight with me. Similar conversations happened multiple times before I started growing inpatient. Five minutes went by, then fifteen, and after what was probably a half hour I was done waiting around. I saw the out of order sign tucked behind a ledge in the wall and threw it on the door before heading into the bathroom.

When I came in, I thought I heard a faint sobbing. "…Kari?"

The sobbing stopped after I said her name. There wasn't an answer so I walked closer to the stalls. While passing one of them, I stepped in a puddle of liquid, which I _knew_ wasn't water. I groaned, cursing to myself at how disgusting some kids could be. I shook off the thought and called out for Kari again.

"Kari? Are you still in here?" I asked, almost feeling like I was talking to myself.

"…H.A…" Her voice seemed all choked up. I walked up to her stall.

"Is something wrong?" I said.

"…The zipper got stuck." She said faintly, clearly crying. I was completely confused.

"What? I don't understand. What are you talking ab-" I cut myself off when it finally hit me. The puddle I stepped in wasn't made by some kid; it was actually made by Kari.

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**Looks** **like we're back to drama and cliff hangars as always. XD This is where I'd normally reply to any reviews I get, but I didn't get any for the last chapter. Not surprising with my inconsistent updates. =P I hope you enjoyed the chapter, and I'll see you next week!**


	18. Chapter 18

**Sunday has come and that means a new chapter! Hopefully you're not in too much suspense on how the last chapter ended. XD I've been busy as hell this week, but thanks to some working ahead I still can get this chapter up on time. Anyways, enjoy!**

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So, there I stood in front of the bathroom stall. Once I figured out what happened, I couldn't think of anything to say about it. I didn't know if Kari wanted to be comforted or left alone. All I knew was I wasn't going to leave until I figured out what I was going to do about it. I turned around and looked at myself in the mirror. You could definitely tell I was stressed out from all the events of that night, not to mention what happened earlier in the day.

"…Are you still there H.A.?" Kari spoke softly. I took a deep breath.

"Yeah…I'm still here." I walked back toward the stall and leaned against it. "Do you…wanna be left alone or something?" It felt really weird talking to her and not actually seeing her face.

"No…" She answered shyly. I looked toward the ground and thought for a moment. What could I do to fix this? This was hardly an experience I've dealt with before.

"Is there anything I can do?" I asked.

"Could you maybe help me…unzip my pants?" She said, very quietly and definitely unsure of herself. I stopped leaning against the stall and waited for her to open it. She didn't open it right away, which I fully understood why. Would you want to stand in front of one of your friends in wet pants? I sure as hell wouldn't.

"Kari…could you open the stall for me, please?" I spoke very delicately. "I want to help. I really do."

I heard the lock move and she slowly opened the door, with her head held down. I could clearly see tears dripping on the floor. I've never seen someone look so upset and embarrassed in my life. Her face was beat red and I don't think I needed to explain anything about her pants.

"I'm so sorry this happened, Kari…" I tried not to look directly at her. She didn't reply. In fact, she didn't even move.

"Do you want me to try and fix the zipper now?" I asked. She slowly nodded her head. I walked up to her and grabbed it, but I blushed when I did. For some reason my mind was taking it the wrong way. I mean, it's not like I was going to take off her pants or something. I was just helping fix a broken zipper. I tugged on it as hard as I could and it definitely didn't feel like it was going to get unstuck easily. I eventually was able to get it to move with a really strong pull and in the process ended up catching a glimpse of her underwear. My face _really_ turned red at the sight of it. I was lucky enough to not have Kari looking at my face or she would've known for sure.

"So, what do we do now?" I said trying to get my mind out of the gutter. "It's not like you have spare clothes on you or anything."

"I don't know…" She replied. "I can't go out there looking like this. I'd be the laughing stock of the school forever…"

I thought to myself for a moment. A few ideas came to mind, but nothing I thought of was going to work. Escape out the bathroom window? It was too high up, and Kari wouldn't fit through one of those "privacy protected" windows anyway. Try to cover it up with a coat or sweater? We didn't have either on us, and that would probably draw more attention to it.

One more idea did pop into my head, and this one I thought had a chance of working. It wasn't going to end well for me, however, but what other choice did we have at that point.

"…I think I have an idea." I muttered. Kari's head jumped up and she looked directly at me, impatiently waiting to hear what it was.

"So…tell me!" She said, with a bit of spark in her voice. I took a deep breath.

"Okay…so we know you can't go back out there in the pants you're currently wearing, right?"

Kari gave me a confused look. "…right…"

"Well…what if you wore _my_ pants?" I said. Kari continued to stare at me rather confused.

"How in the world would that work?" She asked. "People, especially Ian and Dwayne, would ask why I'm wearing your pants when I was clearly wearing something else before."

"Better take my shirt too then." I continued. Kari just shook her head and looked at me weirdly.

"H.A….people are going to question things if I'm wearing your clothes." She stated. "And what about you? What are you going to wear?" I paused, because she had a point. If she has my clothes, what does that leave me with? I got another crazy idea and answered her question.

"Maybe we could play it off as a practical joke on me." I explained. "You only came to the dance with me to play some elaborate prank and force me out in public in just my boxers or something." I shrugged. "I dunno, I'm making this up as I go along. I hope it's working."

Kari looked down for a second. "I…think it could work…but I couldn't do that to you H.A…" She said. "You'd be tortured by everyone for the rest of the year about it."

"Aren't I already?" I looked her in the eyes. "I think me getting made fun of for some silly prank, which could definitely help get people off your back a little, won't do too much damage to my 'amazing' reputation. I care about you far too much to let some little accident ruin your high school life."

Kari didn't say anything, but it looked like she was going to start crying again so she hugged me tightly. I embraced it and hugged back.

"You're the best friend a girl could ever ask for…" She said with her eyes closed. I rubbed her back before breaking up the hug.

"I guess we better get this plan started." I said and started taking off my shirt. Kari started blushing heavily.

"H.A.! What are you doing? You can't get changed in front of me!" She said, rather shocked by my actions.

"What?" I replied. "You're gunna see me without clothes on anyway."

"…" She glanced away from me for a second.

"Alright then." I said and finished taking my shirt off. I noticed Kari couldn't bring herself to stare away from me. I thought it was cute. I smirked and starting taking my shoes and pants off, which really set her off. Her face was so bright red she was almost the same color as me. There I stood, in nothing but my boxers. I let out a small chuckle and handed my clothes to her.

"Here." I said. "You can go change in privacy." Kari didn't grab my clothes, as she looked like she was in a trance. "Kari? You there?"

"Oh!" She said moving her eyes toward my face. "Sorry H.A…"

"Don't worry about it. It's kinda flattering actually." I laughed. She took my clothes and with her face still bright red, went into the bathroom stall to change. I once again looked at myself in the mirror. "So, this is what everyone in the school is about to see in a couple minutes." I thought. I took a deep breath, and tried to psych myself up to it. This wasn't going to be easy to do, but I was willing to do anything for Kari.

A couple minutes passed, and Kari left the stall wearing my clothes. They didn't fit her very well, but they were dry and that's all that mattered.

"Okay now." I said looking toward the door. "Make sure you play the part. Once you leave and attract a little bit of attention, I'll leave a minute or so later to-"

I was stopped midsentence by my head being pulled forward unexpectedly. Kari's lips were suddenly locked together with mine. Without thinking, I closed my eyes and wrapped my hands around her back. Her lips were so warm and soft, and while the kiss didn't last much longer than ten seconds, in my head it was an eternity. I didn't try to take it any further, as it felt so good, so perfect…and I didn't want it to end. Unfortunately, however, it did have to eventually finish.

Once she pulled away from the kiss, my mouth just hung open. Kari's face was still crimson red as she continued to hold on to me.

"…That was for doing all this for me…I hope it wasn't too impulsive or anything." She said feeling rather awkward. I tried my best to take the surprised look off my face.

"I uh…um…" My mind was a jumbled mess at this point, so talking wasn't going to work very well.

"I guess that means you enjoyed it." She said with a small smile and placed her head on my bare chest. "…I know I did." I held her tightly. I still didn't respond to her, and let out a sigh of happiness.

"Was that your first kiss, H.A.?" She asked. I managed to get my mind in one piece for a second to give an actual worded answer.

"Yeah…" I said silently. She giggled.

"How did it feel?"

"It felt…amazing…" I felt her rub my back gently. Oddly enough, I didn't feel nervous about going through with the plan anymore. That kiss was better than all the pep talks in the world combined. I did wonder, as it looked as though Kari enjoyed the kiss as much as I did; maybe it had more meaning to it than a simple "Thanks for everything?" But I was getting way ahead of myself. I needed to get the plan underway before Ian and Dwayne start looking for me or Kari. I loosened myself from her grip and looked into the eyes.

"Are you ready to do this?" I asked. She only nodded. "Alright then. As I said before, once people start noticing you wearing my clothes, you need to act as though it really was a practical joke. That's when I'll leave and act all angry and upset. Sound good?"

"I get it, H.A." She hugged me again. "Thank you _so _much for doing this."

"Just in my nature to help any of my friends." I replied. "We shouldn't waste any more time or else Dwayne…or Ian especially would be looking for us."

"Right." She said and headed for the door.

"Oh!" I said quickly and grabbed her other clothes. "Don't forget your old clothes! You're not going to just throw them away are you?"

I walked over and handed them to her. "Thanks, H.A."

She put her hand on the door, but before she opened it, she turned around to me one more time.

"Good luck." I said with a smile before she could speak. She smiled back and mumbled something to herself that I couldn't quite hear. I guess I wasn't supposed to hear it but she had already left the bathroom at that point. I ran up to the door and put my ear up to it. Already I started to hear people say things about it. I took a deep breath and got ready to make my move.

Meanwhile, Dwayne and Ian were screwing around near the snacks area. Dwayne made some joke in spite of Ian and received a punch to the gut in response. Both shared a laugh but Ian noticed Kari making her way out of the dance in the distance behind Dwayne. He saw what she was wearing and was instantly suspicious.

"…the fuck?" He muttered trying to get a better view.

"Hmm? What's up, dude?" Dwayne asked. Ian just pushed him aside and started for the exit.

"It's nothing. Just wait here a second, alright?" Dwayne just shrugged and looked for something to do.

"What the fuck is going on here?" Ian said to himself as he grabbed the handle of the exit door. Before he could leave, he heard a crowd of people start laughing in the other direction.

"Oh man! This is priceless!" One kid said, barely able to stand with how much he was laughing. Ian pushed him out of the way, and tried moving to what everyone was laughing at. He eventually got near the front and saw me standing there in nothing but my boxers. A heavily confused look came to his face. I sighed and stepped forward.

"Alright, alright." I said with my face red with embarrassment. "Did anyone see which direction she went? I'd like to get my clothes back."

"I dunno man." Someone walked up to me, still dying of laughter. "I like this new look on you!" I simply grabbed him by the face and pushed him into the wall. Some of the laughter quieted down when they saw how pissed I looked. Ian turned around ran for the exit again, this time leaving and went to search for Kari.

"Anyone wanna tell me?" I said with a slightly raised voice. "Or do some of you want a new facelift?"

"Haha…she left man!" Another random kid said. I sighed, pushing people out of the way, and headed toward the exit. Unfortunately, Dwayne stopped me before I could leave.

"Damn!" He said, trying to hold back his own laughter. "What happened man?"

"I'll explain later…right now I just wanna get out of here." I walked outside, with Dwayne following me. The minute I got outside I saw Ian standing arms crossed next to Kari, her face filled with embarrassment again.

"…Shit." I muttered to myself.

"Kari?" Dwayne asked. "What are you doing wearing H.A.'s clothes?"

"I think I can explain that." Ian said. "All I need to do is grab these quick." He went to grab Kari's pants from her, but grabbed him before he could.

"What the fuck man!" He said trying to push me off of him, but I didn't let go.

"I'll explain everything!" I yelled. Kari stepped up.

"…He already knows H.A." She said quietly. I loosened my grip on Ian, and he shoved me.

"Jesus man…can't even fucking trust me." He said fixing his jacket.

"I'm so lost!" Dwayne said. "What's going on?" I gave Ian a look but he ignored it.

"Well, let's just say Kari had a 'little accident.' H.A. didn't want her to be laughed at for it, so he came up with this crazy plan." Kari's face remained bright red.

"Way to go Ian. Just keep embarrassing her. I'm sure that's helping the situation a ton." I said.

"What the fuck do you want me to do? Lie like you are?" He looked pissed. "We're your fucking friends. You'd think you could trust us. I know I'm not gunna say anything to anyone, and I'm pretty damn sure Dwayne won't either."

"…nothing about it at all, right?" I questioned. "This never happened?"

"What the fuck could we possibly gain by talking about it? Honestly H.A." Ian started walking away. "I'll see you later or something…if I feel like it."

"Yikes…he's in a bad mood today." I said looking at Dwayne.

"You do...trust us dude…right?" Dwayne asked. I gave him a pat on the back.

"Of course, man. This is just…really personal for Kari." I looked toward Ian. "Why don't you talk with him? He needs to get that stick out of his ass or something."

"Alright…" He started walking away but turned around toward me. "Oh yeah! Are you still on for this weekend? Trish lives about a couple hours away. Ian could probably borrow his dad's car or something and we can have a mini-road trip. It'll be sweet."

"Sounds good to me." I replied. "See ya, Dwayne."

"Later, dude."

Once he was gone and it was just me and Kari, I let out a pity laugh. "You realize Ian doesn't have a driver's license, right? None of us do."

"That's gunna work out well for you guys." She rolled her eyes.

"Heh…so., what are you gunna tell your parents about this?" I asked.

"I guess I have no choice but to tell the truth." She replied. "It'll probably be the most embarrassing conversation ever, but what else can I do?"

"Oh shit…" I muttered and slapped my forehead.

"What? What is it?"

"I just realized…you're my ride home…" I put my hand over my whole face.

"Oh no…." She looked the other way.

"They're going to show up…see me half naked, and you in my clothes." I stated. "What the hell is gunna be the first thing they think?"

"Oh boy…umm…" She thought to herself for minute. "I…guess I should give them a call to pick us up…"

I sat on the sidewalk. "As if the ride here wasn't awkward enough. So much for your parents thinking highly of me."

"Don't worry, I'll explain everything to them…I think…" She pulled her phone out and starting calling her parents. As she walked away, I was wondering what _my_ mom is gunna say when I got home without my clothes. I prayed hard to myself that things would go down as easy and little awkward as possible. I looked over and saw Kari talking to her parents. She looked a little bit scared while doing so. I couldn't blame her though. They _were_ a bit over protective and the events of tonight probably won't help matters too much. I still wondered about her dad though. All he did was smile and wave once he learned I had two tails. There wasn't a word spoken by him. Her mom didn't seem to mind as much, but it was probably all an act when Kari asked them to not talk about it.

Kari walked back over to me after a minute or two and I stood up.

"So…how did they take it?" I asked. She looked really nervous.

"Better than expected I think…" She said quietly. "My mom's gunna pick us up. We could change at my house and then she'll take you home."

"Just your mom?" I asked.

"That's what I heard on the phone." She shrugged.

"How much did you tell them?" I was curious and hoping she didn't go into too much detail. She blushed a little.

"Of course I didn't say anything about the kiss, H.A." She glanced around unsurely. "I told them what happened in the bathroom…and what you did for me."

"I hope they won't do anything crazy about it." I said.

"Yeah…me too." She replied. Neither of us said anything for a minute. I sat back down on the sidewalk.

"So, about the…kiss." I began. "What made you decide to do it?"

She sat down next to me, but looked toward the ground. "Oh…well, I guess I didn't know how to thank you…I don't know what came over me really..." Her face turned red again. "It didn't help that you're…kinda hot and all."

My face turned red as well after she said that. "Heh…thanks." I looked up into the sky. "So…was that all it was then? Just a way of saying thanks?"

"What do you mean?" She asked, looking at me. I looked at her as well.

"Well…there wasn't any…deeper meaning to it?" I felt incredibly awkward after saying that. I really hope she wasn't going to take it the wrong way. She looked down; probably unsure of her answer.

"H.A…I just…" Her answer was interrupted when she spotted a car in the distance and stood up. "Oh! That must be my mom!"

"Oh, okay…" I muttered. I wasn't very pleased not getting an answer from her about it and stood up. "Well…here we go…"

"My mom already knows, H.A." Kari said. "You're not embarrassed are you?"

"I'm going to be in front of your mom in my boxers." I stated with a completely serious face.

When she pulled up to the school and opened her door, she ran directly to Kari and gave her a hug.

"Oh, honey! I'm so sorry this happened to you!" Kari just accepted the hug, although I could tell she was having a little trouble breathing. "Is everything okay? Are you okay? Do you need anything?"

"Mom…I'm fine." She squeaked out. "Could you please let go of me?"

"I was just so worried. Thank goodness everything is alright." She finally let go.

"You can thank H.A. for that." Kari's mom turned around to look at me, and even though she knew what to expect, it didn't stop her from blushing too.

"Oh my…aren't you cold?" She asked me. I shrugged.

"Eh…it's not that bad outside." I replied. "I don't wanna get used to this though."

"Thank you so much for what you've done for Kari. I don't know how I can repay you." She said.

"It's nothing, really." I said with a smile. "I'm just helping out a friend is all."

"I still can't thank you enou-"

"Mom…" Kari interrupted. "Can we please go home now? I wanna get back into my own clothes."

"Right, right." She nodded and headed back into the car. Even though the passenger seat was open, Kari opted to sit in back with me, most likely to not be in arms reach of her mother. The car ride was rather quiet, which I was glad about. Oddly enough, things were less awkward on the way to her house than they were to the dance earlier. Her dad not being present probably had something to do with that.

After a short drive, we reached her house and headed inside. I looked at the size of her house in amazement.

"Wow…you guys much be rich or something." I said. Kari laughed.

"My parents don't make _that_ much money." She opened the door for me. "My dad's a big businessman. That's why I jumped schools so much."

Once we got inside, Kari immediately went upstairs to her room to change. I stood by the doorway.

"Please, help yourself to a seat H.A." Her mother said, patting the seat cushion of their living room couch. "She'll be ready in a couple minutes. Then I can take you home."

I sat down, still a bit uncomfortable with my lack of clothes. "Thank you."

"Did you have fun at the dance?" The way she looked at me made me feel awkward.

"Uh…yeah…for a little while we had a good time." My eyes keep wandering the room, since I didn't want to stare her mother directly in the face. It felt a little too weird to me.

"She's lucky to have a friend like you." Her mother said with a sigh. "None of her old friends ever treated her as nice as you have."

"Really?" I was pretty surprised at this. "She never told me anything like that…well…she hasn't really talked much about her old friends around me anyway."

She nodded. "I worry about her sometimes. She always gets stressed out so easily. And all the moving doesn't make things any easier for her."

"Yeah…I guess I can see that."

"Is she more stable around you?" Oh boy, what a question to ask. I didn't know exactly how to answer it.

"Oh…well I'm not sure exactly what you mean by stable but she's been okay around me and my friends so far." I lied. Why I lied, I don't know.

"That's good to hear." She clapped her hands together. "I still can't thank you enough."

"Really, you don't need to thank me." I said with a chuckle. "I'm just being her friend."

"I…don't mean to intrude but…" She paused for a second. "May I ask about the two tails?"

"I dunno…" I looked at the ground. "Just born with them. Not much else to say."

I heard Kari coming down the stairs, which meant I finally got to wear clothes again. She handed my clothes back to me.

"Here you go, H.A." She said. "Now you can look decent."

"Heh…thanks." I looked around. "Where should I change?"

"The bathroom's upstairs to your left." Her mother said. I nodded.

"Thanks." I started upstairs but overheard a little bit of what they were saying.

"What a body that boy has..." Her mother said.

"Mom!" Kari yelled. I laughed to myself and went to change. I closed the bathroom door behind me and thought for a moment. This worked out better far better than I expected. No crazy awkward car ride. No weird confrontation with my mother. I was gunna be able to head home acting like the night went perfectly normal. And that kiss…it was just so amazing. I couldn't stop thinking about how great it felt.

Once I finished getting my clothes on, I headed back downstairs. Kari and her mother were there waiting for me. I checked the clock on the wall and saw that it was ten-thirty already.

"Are you ready to leave, H.A.?" Her mother asked.

"Yeah, I guess I'll see you on Monday, Kari?" I said.

She nodded. "Are you gunna be okay in the car by yourself with my mother?" She giggled.

"Kari!" Her mother gave her a look. "H.A. and I had a nice mature conversation while you upstairs, thank you very much."

Kari looked at me oddly. I shrugged my shoulders and let out a small smile. "See ya Kari!"

"Good bye H.A.! Thanks for tonight…" I nodded my head and smiled again before heading out the door. The car ride with her mother wasn't bad or anything. We didn't have too much to talk about, which I didn't mind, but the car ride still felt a bit weird. Before we knew it, I was back home.

"Thanks for the ride, Mrs…um…" Wow. I knew Kari for three days and haven't learned her last name yet? You've gotta be kidding me.

"It's Mrs. Anderson." She replied with a smile. "And there's no need to be so formal. Just call me Linda. And you're very welcome by the way."

"Oh okay…thank you, Linda." I waved goodbye and headed inside my house. Today was so long and stressful I headed to my room without even speaking to my mother about it. I jumped on my bed and drifted off to sleep in a matter of minutes, hoping I'd get a break from it all on the weekend.

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**And that was the longest chapter I have written so far. They seem to be getting longer as I go on, which is a good thing obviously. I don't think Chapter 19 will pass this one but I'm getting ahead of myself. =P Again, this is where I would reply to reviews, but I still haven't gotten anyway. That's okay though. See you all next week!**


	19. Chapter 19

**It's Sunday again! That means a new chapter! So far so good on my promises to keep a weekly schedule. XD I'm hoping you're enjoying the story as it goes on. Hopefully it doesn't take 3 years to do a week of school again. =P Enjoy!**

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"Hi, H.A…" Kari spoke softly to me. I held both her hands tightly with a smile on my face.

"Hi, Kari…" I replied without thought.

"You know…I'm still really thankful for what you did for me at the dance." She slowly started pulling me closer to her.

"You've already thanked me more than enough times." I chuckled, letting her control me.

"Then let me _show_ you how thankful I am…" She closed her eyes as our lips were about to touch. Suddenly, loud music came blaring out of nowhere and before I knew it I was awake in my bed. Apparently someone was calling my phone.

"Ug…whoever you are...it better be worth it." I looked at my phone's screen; it was from Dwayne. I had almost forgotten that we were supposed to meet his girlfriend today. I stretched and yawned before picking up.

"Hey, what's up?" I looked over to my clock and saw it was already past nine. I really must've been tired to sleep that long.

"I've got some bad news, dude." He said. "Ian said he couldn't use his dad's car today."

"I'm not surprised." I climbed out of bed and grabbed some clothes to put on. "I didn't expect his dad to let him use his car when he doesn't have his license."

"It's not all bad though, man." Dwayne continued. "My parents are gunna drive me to her house today anyway. I can spend the weekend there too if her parents are alright with it."

"Well, I'm glad you still get to see her." I said. "Don't worry about me. I'll find something to do."

Dwayne chuckled over the phone. I rolled my eyes. "Don't get any ideas, Dwayne."

"What?" I replied. "I didn't say nothin'."

"I know what you're getting at." I stretched once again. "I don't need to spend every waking moment with Kari."

"You said it, not me, dude." Dwayne said. "Alright, I gotta get ready to head out. Catch ya later."

"See ya, Dwayne." I ended the call. It looked like I was going to have a free day today after all. What to do, I didn't know. I could've called Ian to see if he wanted to hang out, but with the mood he was in last night, I decided not to. And Kari? I figured she wanted some relaxation time after how last night played out. I headed to the kitchen for some breakfast.

"Good morning H.A." My mother told me as I looked through one of the cabinets.

"Morning…" I replied and grabbed a box of cereal.

"So, how was last night?" She asked. "You went to bed as soon as you got home."

"It was okay…" I said, paying more attention to my cereal than the conversation. "It was a little exhausting though."

"And why's that?" She asked. "Had too much fun?"

I rolled my eyes. "We'll go with that, sure."

"You did have fun though, right?" I was honestly surprised my mother was caring about this as much as she was. I nodded my head.

"I guess so…" I said unsurely. "May I eat in peace now?"

"Alright, I'll leave you alone. I can tell you're cranky in the morning. I'm just glad you enjoyed yourself." With that she left the kitchen, and I shrugged my shoulders.

Once I had some breakfast, I headed back to my room to play some video games. It was probably good for me to get some relaxation, too. Not even a full week of school yet, and the weekends were like bliss to me. It wasn't too long before I received a text, and surprisingly it was from Ian.

"What's up? I'm assuming Dwayne told you everything already. Wanna hang out later?" I read the text, sighing with a bit of relief that Ian wasn't upset with me anymore. I contemplated for a bit, and decided that it would be a good idea. I couldn't remember the last time it was only me and Ian hanging out.

"Sure. Name the time and place." I sent out. A couple minutes later a got a text back from him.

"Just head over to my house around 2. I wanna kick your ass at Madden again." I chuckled to myself and gave him the okay before heading back to my video games. After about a half hour I got another text.

"Jesus…what's with people today?" I said to myself, but noticed it was from Kari. Once I opened it, my eyes grew wide after reading it.

"Hey H.A. Are you still seeing Dwayne today? I wanna talk to you about something." I wondered for a few minutes about what she could be talking about. Was it about the kiss? Did I say something I shouldn't have yesterday? I buckled down and replied; letting her know I was staying home today and asking her what it was she wanted to talk about. Not long after sending the text, I started to get a call from her.

"Shit!" I cursed. "Okay…let's hope it's not what I'm thinking of." I shook off any bad thoughts in my mind and answered.

"Hey Kari." I said, with as much enthusiasm as I could muster.

"Hi H.A." She replied.

"So…why'd you call?" I asked. "Normally we just text each other."

"I thought it would be better if we actually talked to each other." She said rather seriously. It threw me off a bit.

"…Is something wrong?" I feared for the worst.

"No, nothing's wrong." She said. I sighed with relief, but away from the phone so she couldn't hear it. "I want to see you though."

"See me?" I questioned. "As in…right now?" I thought I heard a sigh over the phone.

"Is now not a good time?" She asked quietly.

"No, it's fine. Now is fine." I said with reassurance. "So should I get a ride to your house or something?"

"Why don't we meet in the park by the school?" She offered. "It's a nice day out today."

"That sounds like a good idea." I replied but paused for a second. "…What did you wanna talk to me about anyway?"

"I just wanna talk to you in person." She said, still with a serious tone. I didn't know exactly how to take her answer. I felt completely left in the dark about it. What the hell was she going to tell me?

"H.A.? You still there?" I snapped out of my deep thought and remember that I hadn't given a response yet.

"Oh!" I said, a little bit startled. "Sorry about that. I'll let my mom know."

"Okay then, H.A." She sounded a little bit happier at that point. "See you soon!"

"See ya, Kari." I said, hanging up my phone. I stood there completely confused as to what had happened. For some reason she was dying to speak to me in person. I didn't know exactly how to take it, but I didn't waste any time and got ready to leave. My mom was obviously poking fun at me about it, considering she knew how much it bugged me when she talked about me and Kari. Even in the car ride she wouldn't stop with the questions and comments. I took them in stride, however, since I was more focused on the conversation I was going to have with Kari.

I arrived at the park near the school, thanked my mom for the ride, and walked inside. The park wasn't anything special really; just your typical playgrounds, sports courts, and so on. A small shiver went down my spine since I was reminded of the last time I walked through it. It was only four days ago I ran into that gang here, and I still needed to settle things with them. But I wasn't there for that, I was there to meet Kari. I sent out a text letting her know I was there, and she proceeded to call again. I picked up, ready to answer this time.

"Again with the calling I see." I said with a laugh. She laughed in response.

"Oh hush." She replied. "I'm by the swings. In fact I can see you right now."

I turned around and saw her sitting on one of the swings in the distance. "Oh okay." I chuckled, hung up the phone, and walked over, sitting on the swing next to hers.

"Hey." I said quietly.

"I'm glad I could see you." She smiled at me. The way she was acting was still confusing me so much.

"The way you talked on the phone, you made it sound like something serious." I stated. I wasn't going to beat around the bush. I was extremely curious as to what she wanted to say. "What was it you wanted to talk about?"

She sighed and started kicking around dirt with her feet, gently swing in the process. "I was thinking…about the kiss ever since you left last night."

"What about it?" I asked curiously.

"I mean…we consider ourselves really good friends, but…how much do we really know about each other?" She looked at me with a serious face. It definitely wasn't a question I could answer easily. She had a point too. We didn't really know too much about each other. Hell, I didn't even learn her last name till yesterday. I didn't respond to her question, feeling really guilty and hung my head down.

"Let's fix that then." She spoke with a bit more pep in her voice. I lifted my head up immediately.

"What?"

"What's your birthday?" She said quickly.

"February 12th…" I responded, a little unsure about what was going on.

"Ask me what mine is." She said with a smile. I looked around confused.

"You could just tell me." I said with a small chuckle.

"Just ask!" She repeated. I sighed and rolled my eyes.

"What is your birthday Kari?" I said, listening to her demands.

"My birthday's April 4th." She said with a smile. "See? Now ask me another question!"

I let out a small laugh before asking another question about her. The conversation turned out to be a lot of fun. We found out a lot of things we had in common, and some pretty interesting facts about each other as well. It made me feel really content when she told me her favorite color was red. As the conversation went on, she grabbed my hand, swinging me back and forth slightly alongside with her. We had to have talked for easily over two hours when I noticed the time on my phone.

"Oh! I was supposed to see Ian around two today." I said, putting my phone away. Kari let go of my hand and got off the swing.

"Do you think I could tag along?" She asked. I shrugged my shoulders.

"You probably could." I replied. "I mean, it's not like Ian said it had to be just the two of us." Even though I hadn't hung out with Ian by himself in forever, I didn't mind bringing Kari along if I could. I shot Ian a text about it. After about ten minutes of waiting however, Kari and I started to get a little impatient.

"He should be getting back to me soon." I said. "He normally does pretty quickly."

"…Maybe he doesn't wanna hang out with me?" She spoke quietly. I shook my head.

"He probably doesn't have his phone on him or-" I was cut off by a vibration in my pocket. "There he is!"

"What's it say?" She asked.

I read the text to myself. "Of course you want to bring her along. Fine, whatever. She can join us." I tried my best not to have any kind of face giving away what he said and deleted the text immediately.

"He's okay about it." I said quietly. "Wanna head over there now?"

"You mean walk?" She laughed. "Wouldn't that take a bit long?"

"Well, he doesn't live that far from the park." I explained. "We'll leave from the Southern side and be there in no time."

She nodded as we started to walk. I contemplated grabbing her hand, but she grabbed mine before I could make a move.

"So what are we planning on doing at his house anyway?" She asked as we left the park.

"Most likely playing some video games." I replied with a smirk. "You don't seem like the gaming type though."

"Hmph!" She gave me a look. "Are you're saying that cause I'm a girl?"

"Hey, I never said that." I stuck my tongue at her. "You just seem like you've got better things to do than waste time playing games. I bet you don't even own a gaming system."

"…I don't." She looked away for a second. It made me laugh how she reacted.

"I'm kidding, Kari." She gave me another look.

"Stop picking on me!" She pushed me playfully. I chuckled and pushed her back.

"You're gunna have to make me."

"Like this?" She said as she jabbed me in the arm this time, which I had to admit wasn't that bad of a hit.

"Oh! Look who decided to be more physical." I said rubbing my arm. I had to say, this was really fun.

"You're just a big bully." She stuck her tongue at me.

"Call me what you want, I'm not the one hitting you." She gasped and hit me again.

"Come on! You made me!" I kept on laughing, but she joined in on it. When the laughing died down she grabbed my hand again.

"I'm so glad I got to see you today." She sighed with a bit of happiness. "I got to learn a lot more about you."

"Same to you." I said. "It was fun having a drama-less conversation for a change."

"H.A.! That wasn't nice!" She punched me in the arm again, this time not so playfully. Three punches in a span of a few minutes? I must've really been a jerk to deserve that.

"I wasn't talking about you directly." I explained, trying to defense myself. "Any conversation I've had the past three days has been so…serious. You know what I mean."

"Oh…" She rubbed my arm slowly. "I hope I didn't hit you too hard."

"Nah, it's fine." I chuckled. "You do have more of a punch than I expected. I'll give you that."

She giggled and blushed a tiny bit. "Thanks." It only took us a few more minutes before we reached Ian's house and knocked on his door. He answered it and gave me a quick handshake.

"Welcome to my humble abode." He said sarcastically to Kari as we walked inside.

"Are you guys in the middle of redecorating or something?" I asked, since I saw boxes of items sitting in the living room.

"I wish. My mom's new boytoy is moving in soon." He said. I let out a pity laugh.

"How long's she known this one?" He let out a long breath and pretended to think.

"Ohhhh I wanna say….a month and a half?" He shook his hand in the air. "No…not that long, more like just a month."

"I feel bad for asking but…what are you guys talking about?" Kari asked.

"My mom's a slut." Ian replied quickly but I pushed him back.

"What he meant to say is his mom has…trouble with relationships." I said. "She's a very nice woman if you get the chance to meet her."

"You only say that because she's hit on you before, H.A." Ian smirked. I smacked my forehead and Kari started chuckling.

"She did not hit on me, you're just exaggerating-why are we even having this conversation?" I replied trying to ignore him. "Let's just do something besides talk about your mom."

"I have no complaints on that idea." Ian replied with a laugh. We headed into his room, which wasn't very clean, having clothes and other things all over the place. As Ian handed me a controller, Kari looked at me awkwardly, probably feeling like a third wheel. I decided to speak up.

"Why don't I let Kari take you on first?" I handed her the controller. "I wanna see her chops."

"H.A., I have no idea how to play this game." She replied, trying to give the controller back to me. I wouldn't accept it.

"Nah, I'll show ya how." I said. Ian laughed.

"It'll be too easy to beat her. How many girls could stand a chance against me at Madden?" Kari gave him a serious look.

"You know what?" She smiled. "You're on!"

"Now we're talking!" I said with excitement. While the game was loading, I taught Kari all the basics about the game and controls, which I was surprised she didn't get too confused by. At the start of the game, Ian was destroying her, but I helped her out the best I could. At halftime the score was 28-14 in favor of Ian.

"You're still in it, Kari." I said. Ian just kept his smug look on his face. Kari sighed with frustration.

"How do you guys have fun doing this? It's so annoying!" She complained.

"Awww, not having fun losing to me?" Ian teased. I could tell Kari was getting even more frustrated, so I stepped in.

"Take it easy on her, man. She's new at this." I turned to Kari and put my hand out. "You want me to finish the game?"

"No! I can do this!" She raised her voice. I shrugged and stepped back.

"…Alright then, go get 'em." I smiled and got ready to watch the show. The second half wasn't much different than the first though. Kari finally gave up and handed the controller to me. Unfortunately, there was nowhere near enough time to make any kind of comeback, and we lost 45-28.

"Don't worry about it, Kari." I said with a small laugh. "I hardly ever beat him either."

"Cause I am a _boss._" Ian pumped his arms in the air like some kind of airheaded champion.

"Yet, whenever I beat him, he always claims I cheated." I rolled my eyes, which made Kari laugh. Suddenly, I started to get a phone call.

"It's my mom." I said standing up. "I wonder what she wants."

Ian and Kari shrugged their shoulders.

"Well, whatever it is, I'll take it outside. See you guys in a bit." I walked outside before answer the phone. With me gone, that left Kari and Ian alone.

"So…" Ian said without hesitation the minute I was gone. He hated awkward silences. "I take it H.A. can't spend a minute without you around now?"

"Ian…" She gave him another look. "Actually it was _me_ who asked him to hang out." Ian stretched.

"Whatever. Just watch yourself." Kari stared at him oddly.

"What do you mean?"

"No more of this bullshit." He seemed a bit aggravated. "I've never seen someone so up and down. You're throwing H.A. in circles."

"I'm not that bad…" She looked toward the ground. "…am I?"

"Well, H.A. told me about your conversation with him at the dance." She lifted her head up, a little surprised. "Promising something you're not even close to sure about?"

She didn't respond and put her head back down, feeling really guilty as Ian continued. "_And_ doing so the same day you turned him down at the dance, and _then_ changing your mind only hours later."

"I'm sorry…" She spoke quietly.

"Apologies don't mean shit if you don't do something about it." He grabbed a bottle of water and took a sip from it. "…I worry about you."

Her eyes bolted open in shock by that response and she turned back toward him. "You're worried about _me_? I thought you were worried about H.A."

"He can handle himself. I don't need to do anything about that." He leaned back in his chair. "I mean, he did piss me off when he couldn't trust me last night, but I think I can throw that toward the heat of the moment or something. You though, you seem a bit too soft skinned for this."

"This?" She asked, wondering exactly what he meant. Ian looked toward his door, checking to see if I was still gone, which I was, and continued.

"Our group." He replied. "Our circle of friends or whatever the hell you wanna call it. Don't try to act like you don't know what I'm talking about. You're struggling to be considered an 'outcast' by everyone else at the school, and I can understand why. I just don't think you'll ever handle it."

"I'm getting used to it…" She tried to figure out something to say to prove him wrong, but nothing came to mind. "Why do you care so much anyway?"

"Well, that was cold." He said boldly. "You're quick to forget that I like you, remember?"

"Then why do you treat me so much differently than H.A.?" She said, trying to changing the subject away from her problems.

"I think that's pretty obvious. We're two different people. What, you think I treat you bad?"

"…Sorta." She said, rather quietly. Ian got up and sat down next to her, which made her feel a little uncomfortable.

"Who's protected you from Devon…twice?" He asked in a very serious tone.

"You did…" She replied, not looking at him directly. She didn't notice Ian was getting even closer to her.

"I may not be Mr. Sensitive like H.A. Hell, I know I come off too strong for most people, but don't think I don't care about my friends, because I do." He slowly moved Kari's face toward his. "Especially you."

Kari looked him in the eyes, but didn't respond. It was only a moment longer that the gap between their faces closed, as Ian pulled in to kiss her. Kari didn't try to pull away either. To her surprise, she actually enjoyed it for what it was. After a few seconds passed, Ian broke the kiss. All Kari did was blush heavily. She was far too confused to say anything, and her mind was too jumbled to even think straight. Ian almost looked confused too by her actions.

"I was expecting to get hit in the face for doing that…am I missing something?"

"…I don't know…" She mumbled. Ian kept his eyes locked on her.

"Does that mean you enjoyed it?" Before she could answer, they heard the front door close, meaning that I was back inside. Ian hopped back into his chair as I walked into the room.

"My mom wants me home apparently." I said. "I told her I was here so she'll be picking me up soon. You need a ride, Kari?"

She looked over toward Ian, who didn't say or do anything, and nodded her head. I raised an eye brow at her silent answer.

"Okay then…" I said slowly. "Ian, you got some grub? I'm getting kinda hungry."

"Sure dude." He got up. "I should have something."

"Are you hungry, Kari?" I asked as Ian walked out of the room.

"No…not really…thanks." She spoke in a very unsure tone which worried me.

"Is everything alright?"

She nodded her head again. "It's nothing. I'll be fine."

I crossed my arms. "Did Ian say something to you?" I felt a tap on my shoulder, and was greeted by Ian's face when I turned around.

"Enough chit chat it's time to eat!" He said patting me on the back. "I'm probably as hungry as you are."

"You wanna join us, Kari?" I asked. Without a response, she got up and followed us into the kitchen. Something seemed really off to me. She was much more energetic before I took my phone call. Ian had to have done something. She hardly spoke as me an Ian traded witty comments against each other, or even sharing a laugh or two with us. I didn't want to say anything in front of Ian, so I left it alone.

Once we finished eating, right on cue my mom's car pulled into the driveway. I gave Ian a quick fist bump before headed out the door with Kari.

"So, what did Ian say to you?" I asked as we left the house. She sighed. There was a short pause before she answered.

"He just…told me about your conversation with him at the dance." She lied. "That's all H.A."

I shook my head as we got in my mom's car, both of us in the back seat. I decided not to talk about it with my mom in the car. I never got to finish the conversation with her since she was dropped off at her house first before I was taken home. I sent her texts, but she didn't respond to them, which got me really worried. I even tried calling her but she didn't pick up. After a while I gave up and hoped things would be better tomorrow.

Back at Kari's house, she buried her head in her pillow and thought to herself for a long time. She didn't understand why she liked Ian's kiss. It didn't make any sense and aggravated her. She thought it would be a bad idea to answer any of my calls or texts in case she accidentally told me about her kiss with him. She didn't want to ruin anything between me and Ian, and forced herself to keep quiet. It was almost starting to feel like she had a choice to make; between me and Ian. Originally she thought it was a no-brainer, but what Ian had said before really struck her deep. She looked at the last text I sent to her, simply saying "Please talk to me Kari", and turned her phone off for the night.

"I'm sorry H.A…" She said to herself quietly before drifting off to sleep.

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**Let the drama continue! Still no reviews, but that's okay. I'll keep on writing anyway. =P I've got a lot of free time over the next couple of weeks so that's always a good thing. Thanks for reading!**


	20. Chapter 20

**You're probably wondering why I haven't updated this in a little over a month after a successful start to weekly updates. Well, there are a few reasons really. The first once is this chapter's content was very hard to get written out properly. There were a few scenes that I've rewrote multiple times, since I never liked the way they came out before the final draft. The second reason is a bit more obviously, doing weekly updates takes a big toll on my free time, and during the month of February and early March when I did do them weekly, I had absolutely no time for anything other than this fanfiction whenever I did have some time to myself. Now, no offense to people who still read this, but my views on this aren't very high for how much I need to put into this to make it weekly. I'm thinking bi-weekly updates should work just fine for me though. I won't get myself burned out, and you'll still get a steady dose of Mobius High. =P So, get ready to see updates come every other Monday from now** **on.** **Enjoy the chapter!**

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The rest of the weekend went by fairly quickly, mostly due to the fact I had no one to really talk to or hang out with. Dwayne woke me up Sunday morning, once again, to tell me how his day with Trish went, with a little too much detail to my liking. He then told me he was going to be there till the end of the weekend. I was a little bummed out about that, but the feeling went away when he started his whole "Kari speech thing" after finding out I hung out with her the day beforehand. Ian, surprisingly, didn't feel like hanging out either. He really seemed to wanna hang out Saturday, and almost looked pissed off that I brought Kari along. I didn't try to push it after he said no to my request.

It was even weirder with Kari, since I never even got a response from her. Ever since I left her with Ian for a few minutes, she hasn't spoken a word to me. She wasn't returning my texts; she wasn't answering my calls; nothing. I almost wanted to head over to her house myself and see what her problem was. Whatever Ian did to her was still on my mind, even after Kari told me all that happened was Ian telling her about my conversation with him from the dance. There wasn't any way possible just telling her that would throw her into this state of depression or whatever you want to call it. I tried my best to find something to do for the rest of the day, actually wanting to go back to school for the first time in my life.

Monday rolled around, and after getting ready in the morning, I jumped on my bus and sat down with Dwayne and Ian. Dwayne I could tell really enjoyed his time over the weekend. Ian oddly enough looked pretty upbeat himself as well. Saturday was still on my mind, obviously, and I wanted to pry at him about it.

"Yo, Ian." He looked toward me. "Has Kari said anything to you since we were at your house?"

"Yeah, I've gotten a few texts from her." He replied. I shook my head with frustration.

"You've gotta be kidding me." I threw my head back against the seat of the bus. "She hasn't said a word to me since."

"…Did something happen to you guys?" Dwayne asked. Ian's eyes darted away after Dwayne's question, but I spoke up.

"Not that I know of." I shrugged, not wanting to start anything with Ian this early in the day. "She seemed like she didn't want to be around anyone."

"I dunno what to tell ya, man." Dwayne said. "At least the day started off good."

I rolled my eyes. "She's worried the hell out of me." I saw Ian texting out of the corner of my eye and sat up in my seat. "Are you talking to her right now?"

"None of your business." He said, not even turning toward me to speak.

"I just wanna know what's up." I said reaching for his phone, but he knocked my arm back.

"Hands off my phone." He snapped.

"Easy!" I shouted back. "Just a quick text."

"Well you'll get to see her when you get to school." He replied, still in his slightly nasty tone. I figured I wasn't going to get him to budge so I sat back down in my seat, impatiently waiting to get to school. Dwayne still looked incredibly puzzled at the situation and I told him not to worry about it.

Once I saw the school in the horizon, I felt a bit better about the situation. Be able to finish our conversation from Saturday was what I was waiting to do ever since it was interrupted. I was just hoping she was in a better mood now. When we headed inside and I was immediately introduced to a ton of posters around the school. All the pictures had me from the school dance in my boxers. Normally, this and all the laughing kids would get to me, but that wasn't the important thing right now. I knew Kari was going to be at her locker soon, so I was almost running to mine at that point. Once I got there, she wasn't anywhere in sight. I prayed I hadn't missed her yet, and got my wish only a minute later. Kari stopped walking the minute I looked toward her. I tried my best to put on a normal face before responding.

"Hey." I said. "How'd the rest of your weekend go?"

"O-Oh…" She stuttered. "It…it was okay. What about yours?"

"Not so good." I walked up to her. "You know why, obviously. Why didn't you reply to any of my texts or calls all weekend?"

She didn't respond and looked down. This was starting to frustrate me. "Kari, now's not the time to get all depressed on me." I lifted her head up and stared at her seriously. "Did Ian do anything to you?"

"No!" She said quickly pulling away from me and opened her locked up quickly. "He didn't do anything to me, H.A."

I glanced at her. "Nothing?"

"Nothing happened, H.A. It's alright." She started closed her locker. "I really gotta go now. The announcements aren't going to say themselves after all."

I sighed. "Alright, Kari. I'll see you second period okay?"

She nodded. "Bye."

As she walked away I rubbed the back of my neck. That conversation certainly didn't go exactly as I expected. I tried to make the best of it and spent first period messing around with Dwayne. Still, no matter what I did, between jokes with Dwayne, scribbling in my notebook, or even actually paying attention in class, my mind could not focus away from the whole situation with Kari. I tried planning what I was going to say, but nothing I thought of seemed like it had a chance of working.

As Kari got back into her class, Ian spotted her and told to her sit down next to him in the back. Kari surprisingly followed his command and walked toward him.

"Hey." He said. Kari looked at him, a little unsure of what to tell him.

"Hi Ian." She replied and sat down. With a sigh, she decided to let it out. "So, I talked to H.A. in the hallway."

Ian raised his eyebrows at her statement. "You say anything about this weekend?"

Kari glared at him angrily. "No, I didn't say anything. I'm not stupid, Ian."

Ian chuckled. "He was all worried about you or something the last I talked to him. I wasn't really paying attention."

Kari knew I would be worried, but just hearing the words from Ian made her feel guilty. She sat motionless, without responding to Ian. He noticed this right away.

"Come on, of course he's gunna get worried. The guy's in hearts with you or some shit."

"I know…" She spoke very quietly. Ian looked at her very seriously.

"This is gunna be outta the blue, but I'm curious. Why did you say yes when I asked you to come over Sunday anyway?" He asked. "After all, Saturday was a bit…dramatic." Kari looked at him unsurely, but quickly turned the other way without saying a word.

"…Okay…an answer would've been nice." He slouched back in his chair. "Just wondering what's going on in that head of yours."

"To be honest, I don't know myself right now." She replied shaking her head. She tapped her desk, showing a bit of frustration. "Things got crazy so quick over the weekend. First I hung out with H.A., and things were good, and then we went to your house and we still had fun but the kiss and everything and I'm worried I'm gunna screw things up and-"

"Slow down, Jesus." Ian grabbed her arm. He looked up toward the front of the room to see if the teacher had noticed them, which he did not. Kari sighed and tried to clear her mind before speaking.

"Why are you doing this?" She asked. Ian hadn't let go of her arm yet, and Kari could feel him gripping harder.

"What do you mean why I'm doing this?" He responded, a bit of anger in his voice. "I think we've been over this already. Bla bla bla feelings for you and all that."

"But what about H.A.? You know this will crush him right?" Ian didn't respond right away, as he finally let go of her arm. He was normally good at thinking on his feet, but this silence made Kari feel very awkward. As he sat back in chair with his arms crossed, Kari couldn't take the silence anymore.

"Well?" She said impatiently.

"If you're so damn worried about hurting him, then fucking date him already." He said under his breath. Kari looked at him, knowing she hit a nerve with her last statement. She could tell he was getting angry, so she turned toward the front without a response and paid attention for the rest of the class.

Once the bell rang in my class, everyone headed out into the hallway, with Dwayne still trying his best to cheer me up. I tried to ignore everything he was saying as I needed to speak to Kari for a legitimate conversation. Our little chat in the hallway before wasn't good enough for me, and I wanted to know all the details.

Kari saw me in the distance when she was about to head into the classroom. She sighed to herself, thinking all this was her fault. Before I noticed her, she ran inside. Ian was already there, but this time she decided to sit by herself, not wanting to cause any more problems with him as well. Dwayne and I got to class only a minute later, and when I saw Ian and Kari on opposite sides of the classroom, it confused me a little. I know I wanted to talk to Kari, but at that moment I got a different idea.

"Dwayne, why don't you talk with Kari?" I suggested. "Maybe you could help cheer her up or something."

"Umm…okay, dude." He said, a little confused. "What are you gunna do?"

"I need to have a chat with Ian about something." I replied, speaking rather seriously. Dwayne shrugged and went over to sit down with Kari. I sat down across from Ian, his eyes glancing toward me as I did.

"You want something?" He asked. I put my hands on the table and looked him in the eyes.

"I'm pretty sure you know what I wanna talk about."

Ian put whatever he was reading down and sat up. "Nope. Don't know what you're talking about actually."

"Come on." I spoke with a bit of frustration. "It's pretty obvious that Kari's been acting all out of whack ever since Saturday."

Ian didn't respond and went back to his reading, but I continued. "She hasn't said a word to me, and now I find out she's only talking to you." He glanced at me again. "Something tells me you did something to her."

He chuckled to himself. "Once again, you're blaming everyone else for your problems."

"What the fuck could I have done to make this happen?" I said with a slightly raised voice. This made Dwayne and Kari look over toward us.

"I dunno." He said without a care. I hit the table and tried to control my temper.

"Just tell me, did you do something to Kari on Saturday?" Kari overheard me ask this, and felt her stomach drop. Ian looked at me coldly, not responding immediately. He moved forward in his seat and gave his answer.

"It's none of your business what I do." That answer put me over the edge as I couldn't hold back my anger any further, but Ian continued talking. "Now, why don't you get off my back and sit somewhere else-" I suddenly jumped over the table and tackled Ian to the floor.

"What did you do to her!" I said as I pushed him against the floor, clutching his shirt. Ian hardly even tried to fight back oddly enough. Dwayne and few other kids ran over to pull me off of him, but I threw a few punches before they could.

"Dude! Stop it!" Dwayne yelled, holding me back. "Do you wanna get suspended or something!"

Ian got off the ground and wiped his mouth for any blood that was on it. He hardly responded to the fact I just tried to beat the answer out of him and this only further aggravated me.

"What the fuck did you do to Kari!" I yelled. Ian shook his head.

"You're fucking crazy."

"And you're a dick! What the hell is going on with you lately!"

"Say's the guy who just jumped a table to attack me."

"I'm gunna-"

"…H.A…" Kari said quietly behind me. My temper disappeared immediately by the sound of her voice. I turned around, feeling ashamed of what I just did.

"Kari!" I said. "I…I'm sorry…I didn't want things to get like this-"

"Stop." She interrupted. A lot of kids were still looking in my direction, which made Kari feel very uncomfortable. She wanted to speak to me privately about this.

"Could I talk to you in the hallway, H.A.?" I glanced toward Ian. His eyes stared at me coldly, and never once glanced away. At that point I thought I had completely ruined our friendship. There wasn't going to be a way of talking my way into fixing things with him. I looked back toward Kari and nodded my head as we walked out into the hallway.

I tried to play out the way the conversation was going to go in my head, hoping I could come up with the right things to say. I didn't know what to expect from her, but oddly enough I was feeling a little relieved. It was probably because she actually wanted to talk to me again, but what she was going to talk about was the problem. She stared at me, almost teary eyed. I didn't feel pity for her though. I was getting sick of all the drama.

"Well?" I said, waiting for an answer.

"Something…did happen at Ian's house, H.A." She spoke coldly. I tried to get prepared for whatever she was going to tell me.

"Obviously. I think I could figure that part out. What was it then?" I asked. She started to legitimately cry at this point, but only a little bit. My sympathy was still nonexistent, and I grew impatient rather fast.

"Kari, tell me!" I demanded. All this drama needed to be settled, and I wasn't letting her breakdown to make things take longer than they needed to.

"I…kissed Ian…" She spoke quietly. I looked at her with a blank stare. My facial expression said it all to her as she continued to cry. "…I'm sorry…" She tried to cry into my chest but I wouldn't let her. I pushed her away and looked at her.

"What the fuck…" She didn't respond right away and turn around, thinking to herself. I was probably not taking the situation delicately enough, but I walked toward her and turned her around to face me.

"I'm done waiting for answers." I said coldly. "Is that all that happened?"

"…No…I also went over to his house Sunday…and more stuff happened…I didn't mean for anything like this to happen H.A. I'm really sorry…" She admitted quietly. This was getting ridiculous. I shook my head and walked away, trying to get rid of my frustration. I felt betrayed, yet again, by the girl I loved. How many chances I was going to give her, I didn't know. At last, I couldn't take it anymore, and grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Why do you keep doing this shit!" I was starting to lose control at this point. "Is it my tails again? Is my status as an outcast too fucking much for you again? You keep throwing me into these stupid loops with your damn bi-polar emotional jumps. I wanna know why the hell this keeps happening!"

Her eyes opened wide as I finished ranting. "H.A….I don't know…"

"Again with the fucking 'I don't know' bullshit. You know what?" I looked directly into her eyes. "If you don't want to tell me, fine. Lie like you don't know what's going on. Cause that's the cool thing to do I guess."

"Why are you getting like this?" She said with a raised voice, her eyes filled with water. "This is why I didn't want to say anything…I'm sorry!" She tried to embrace me again, but I pushed her away hard this time, almost knocking her over.

"Fuck you and fuck your bullshit apologies…I'm done with all of it." I walked past her and went back inside the classroom. Kari didn't move or say a word. Her mind and body were completely in shock over the heated conversation's ending. I could hear her sobbing even after I had closed the door to the room, where a lot of kids were starting at me, Ian and Dwayne included.

"What the fuck are all of you looking at?" I spoke rather intimidatingly as I headed toward a seat all by itself in the back of the classroom. Most of the kids went back to work like nothing happened, but a few didn't shy away so easily.

"Geeze, I think you could get your own show, haha." Some kid said with a laugh. At this point I didn't care about the consequences, so I grabbed the nearest textbook and nailed the kid across the face with it. He wasn't bleeding, but it shut him up really quick. Once I got to my seat, Ian had a look of surprise on his face. He assumed that Kari had told me everything that happened, and expected me to go crazy on him, considering I had only minutes earlier. To be honest, I wondered myself why I didn't lay a finger on him. I could easily blame him for this whole situation, but for some reason I thought otherwise.

Dwayne walked over to me, definitely still curious about the whole thing, but I waved him off. I wanted to be to myself the rest of the period; probably the rest of the day actually. I started thinking about what the next logically thing to do was. As I leaned back in my chair, the idea of starting over came to mind. Forget about Kari, hell, forget about Ian, too. Let them do whatever they want, and get my life back to normal. After all, things only starting going south the moment I met Kari anyway. I was pulled away from my thoughts when I saw Ian standing in front of me.

"Where's Kari?" He asked.

"Probably still out in the hallway crying." I spoke rather bluntly, not even making eye contact with him. He gritted his teeth and gave me a deathly glare, before walking out of the classroom. It didn't bother me anymore, as Kari was his problem now. The random ups and downs in her emotions just became too much for me, and I had to let go. To think that I came so close with her, only to have it crash land mere hours later, felt like a huge disappointment.

A few minutes later, Ian and Kari entered the classroom, and to my surprise, Kari looked a lot better. I didn't know what Ian said to her, but whatever it was, it definitely worked. I tried my best to keep to myself, and didn't say a word for the rest of the period.

As the day dragged on, I slowly started to open up on my thoughts to Dwayne. Obviously enough, he disagreed with everything I said, despite learning the entirety of my conversation with Kari. He really wanted me and Kari to get together still, but I continued to throw the idea out the window whenever he brought it up. I started to notice that Kari hadn't even tried to say a word to me since our confrontation. Maybe it actually went through her head that I was done trying with her, but my money was on Ian's "Words of wisdom" that he kept preaching toward her.

I headed to my locker, actually starting to feel a little bit better. The disappointment and frustration were obviously still there, but even the idea of pushing Ian and Kari out of my life made it feel like a huge load was taken off of my back. I started feeling more optimistic about the situation, and looked at all the good that could come from it. Then, the dance came to my mind, and I stopped dead in my tracks.

"Kari's kiss…" I said to myself. "It was so…perfect. And how connected we were when we danced that night." My eyes started to feel heavy and I ran into the men's bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. "She even stood up for me against Devon…" I saw a tear drop fall down my face. It was the strangest feeling to me. I couldn't cry. I was too strong to let that happened, but I couldn't stop it. I went into one of the stalls, sat down, and put my hands on my face.

"She…she even said she wanted our friendship to work…" I continued to talk to myself. I sat there with only the sound of my crying being audible. The feeling of crying out of control was so odd, yet highly relieving. I didn't even know why I started in the first place. Was it her betrayal that started this? Was it my actions against her? I tried to calm myself down, but it just wasn't going to happen so easily. I was lucky enough that no one else had entered the bathroom during my breakdown. I took me a few minutes, but I finally managed to stop my crying and walked out of the stall.

"I…can't believe I just did that." I looked at myself again in the mirror and saw that my eyes were all red. I started to wash my face with water from the sink, hoping it would help my appearance, and fortunately it did. I took a deep breath and walked out of the bathroom.

"You were in there a long time." Ian said, standing by the bathroom door. "I saw you run in probably ten minutes ago."

I didn't even look at him, and kept walking to my locker. As I opened it, I remembered Kari's locker was next to mine. Just a few days earlier this was the greatest coincidence of my life, but now it was the complete opposite. I heard her locker open, but I didn't see her since her view was blocked by my locker's door. I was done getting my thinks for my next class, but thought of keeping my locker open until she left.

"Fuck it…" I whispered to myself and slammed my locker shut, leaving her in my view. To my surprise, Kari didn't say a word to me. In fact, she didn't even look in my direction. I was looking directly at her, but she acted as though I wasn't even there. As she finished getting her things, she closed her locker and started to walk away, leaving me still staring at her, completely shocked.

"I guess…I'm getting what I wanted…" I thought and proceeded to walk to my next class.

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**Well, things seem to be getting quite angsty around these parts now. XD Time for viewer comments!**

**Naoko: **Thanks! ^_^ I'm glad you think my writing is so great. I hope this chapter didn't come out too late for you. =P

**Casino Nights:** Thanks! I'm happy to see you like the fic so much!


	21. Chapter 21

**It's Monday, and that means a new chapter! As you can tell, things are getting rather depressing and angsty around these parts, and this next chapter doesn't help matters too much. XD Who knows what direction it will go in next, but this current arc of the storyline has just been fascinating and so much fun to write. I hope it's just as fun to read as well. Enjoy!**

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Five days went by, and Friday rolled around the corner at the blink of an eye. The promise I made to myself was kept; I hadn't spoken a word to Ian or Kari since Monday. Whenever we saw each other in the hallway, it always felt like a game of chicken; who would breakdown first and actually say a word to the other? At first, I had an empty feeling in my stomach whenever I saw her by my locker, but the more she treated me like I wasn't there, the more that feeling went away. Ian still knew I existed, however, as he always seemed to glance at me, almost like he wanted me to speak up, whenever he got the chance.

Throughout the week, I noticed Kari's overall mood change. I know it's nothing new considering her unstable emotions, but this time it seemed like it moved in one steady direction. She started off very depressed and upset over Monday's events, but gradually her mood brightened up and her tone of voice was closer to how I remember it from the first day I met her. Not only that, but I could tell she was getting closer and closer to Ian with every day that passed. I started to think that they had become official. I couldn't know myself since I was no longer speaking to either of them, and Dwayne seemed to have no clue what was going on still. It sickened me with jealousy. That was definitely a new emotion for me.

I sighed as I finished getting my things for first period from my locker. I suddenly heard two familiar voices coming toward me and knew immediately who's they were. Ian seemed to follow Kari almost everywhere now. I couldn't tell if Ian was purposely trying to piss me off, but I was so far off that ship by now that it almost didn't faze me anymore.

"You did _what_ yesterday?" Kari said with a laugh. "C'mon Ian, you can't do that in class!"

"I'll do whatever the hell I want in class." He responded with a laugh of his own. "It's only three days detention. I've had plenty worse."

I slammed my locker, prompting both of them to look in my direction, not at me obviously, but the sound startled them.

"One second Ian…" Kari said and walked toward me. My heart jumped when she headed in my direction. This came out of nowhere for me. What was I going to say? I wasn't prepared for this to happen. Not much was going to be said, however, as Kari walked right passed me and opened her locker up. I mentally kicked myself, almost forgetting that our lockers were right by each other. For some odd reason this gave me the feeling of my hopes being up, but I was confused by it. This was what I wanted right? I looked toward Ian, and found his eyes looked directly at me as well. I felt like I should've said something, but started walking to my next class instead, not wanting to waste my time on it.

As I headed into Chemistry class, Dwayne was already there and I gave him a quick high five. He was my only friend now really. I felt a little bit guilty about him being all confused about all of the drama, but he seemed to have been taken it in stride. He always seemed so optimistic.

"How goes things, dude?" He asked.

"You know how it is." I said stretching in my chair.

"I still think you should fix things!" He said. "It's not too late, man!"

I shook my head. "It's not worth it anymore, Dwayne. Case and point, not once since Monday have I gotten into a fight, an argument, or any other sort of stupid drama." I looked at the ceiling while continuing my mini rant. "All the unstable emotions in Kari, and Ian's constant yelling in my ear…it's nice to get away from it. I'm pretty sure this is how it's gunna be…for a while."

"Aha!" He said. "You said 'for a while.' I knew you were double guessing this."

"Enough Dwayne." I sighed, cutting him off. "I don't want to talk about it."

He looked at me without an immediate response, but decided to give up on it and turned around to the front of class. What I said was true; there was definitely some good coming out of this. Besides the lack of fighting, I was actually paying more attention in school. Instead of focusing all my energy on Kari, I could focus on work. It was odd though, because I never cared for trying hard in school before I met her. Why the sudden care in good grades?

It wasn't long before Kari's voice was heard over the loudspeaker as she spoke the announcements. Every day I tried to picture someone else's voice coming through the speakers but it wasn't any use. So I took plan B, and ignored them the best I could. Maybe important information was being told, but I'm sure Dwayne could give me details on anything I really needed to know. The announcements finished in a few minutes, and the teacher stood at the front of the class, holding a pile of papers, which everyone knew what that meant.

"It's time for our first quiz of the year." The classroom groaned in unison as everyone started pulling out their notes. Dwayne jumped up in his seat at those words.

"I didn't know about a quiz!" He looked around in his binder for notes on anything from the week, but being him, he never wrote any. I tapped his shoulder and handed him a couple pieces of paper.

"He said we had a quiz yesterday. This is all we had this week." I said, patting him on the back. "Better study up for thirty seconds before he gets the tests out."

"Thanks, dude." He replied and tried to skim my notes as fast as he could. The teacher told everyone to put away their notes a moment later, and handed out the quiz. I was pleasantly surprised at how easily I knew every question, even though there were only twenty. Paying attention in class actually paid off! Who would've thought?

I handed my quiz in to the teacher at his desk, and to my surprise, I was actually the first one to finish. He looked over it quick and gave me a small smile.

"Very nice work H.A." He complimented.

"Heh…thanks…" I replied before heading back to my seat. Dwayne nudged me as soon as I did.

"Hey…" He whispered. "What'd you get for question four?"

I smacked my forehead. "You're only on question four-ug…nevermind…" I looked up to the front of the class to see if the teacher was looking. "It's D…and I'm not helping you anymore. I don't need to get in trouble again…"

"…Fine…" He mumbled before returning to his test. It took another fifteen minutes before the rest of the class was finished, Dwayne being one of the last ones to hand his test in.

"If you don't think you did well, don't worry." The teacher began as Dwayne was basically bashing his head against his desk. "It's only the first quiz of the year. We still have a long way to go."

"I don't know whether that's a good thing or bad thing…" He groaned as the bell rang. I sighed as I got up and headed out of the classroom. Study Hall was coming up; the only class of the day Kari and I had together. Despite me getting used to treating second period like any other one, I still couldn't help but look over at Ian and Kari every day. No matter what I tried to focus on, my eyes keep looking toward them, wondering what their lives have been like since my decision to break things off.

On the way to my locker, I was hit in the back of the head by a paper ball. I could tell it was one of the photos of me at the school dance before I even opened it up. I ignored whoever it was who threw it at me, as I had almost forgotten about the dance.

"Can't believe it's been a week already…" I said to myself, holding onto the paper ball. I crushed it even further in my hand and tossed it behind me. "I wonder if I made the right decision that night…"

Upon finally getting to my locker, I saw that Kari was already there, with Ian once again. She was already on her way to study hall, but she dropped one of her notebooks. I noticed it, but neither she nor Ian had a clue about it. I figured I couldn't let her lose it, so I picked it up, and with a big sigh, spoke up for the first time that week.

"Hey!" They both turned around. "You dropped this." As I went to hand it to her, Ian snatched it violently from my hands and gave it to her. I clenched my fist, wanting so bad to flip out at him, but I knew it wasn't worth it. I turned back to open to my locker, but overheard Kari thanking him for getting the book back for her. Hearing that was too much for me, and I punched then nearest wall as hard as I could.

"Fuck!" I yelled, grabbing my hand in pain. The wall was fine, but my hand was killing me. "What a bunch of bullshit…I don't fucking get it."

"Dude!" Dwayne yelled from across the hall. "You alright?"

"I'll be fine." I said shaking my wrist. "Just a little frustrated, that's all."

After finally grabbing what I needed from my locker, we headed to study hall. In just over a week's time, a lot had happened in this room. Between Kari's first rejection to me, and my eventual break off with her, I was starting to think study hall was the worst class of the year. Immediately after entering the room I already had my eyes darted toward Ian and Kari. I pulled myself away from them, and took my seat near the back of the class. Dwayne sat across from me with an excited look on his face.

"Dude, you got your DS?" He began. "We should co-op on something!"

"Nah, I'm good." I replied. "I think I'll kick back and relax."

"C'mon, you never turn down video games!" He said. "Snap out of it already!"

I rubbed my forehead. "Dwayne, please. I've got some school work to do."

"Where's the real H.A.!" He stared at me closely. "You're a fake! The real H.A. wouldn't pick school over having fun."

I honestly laughed at the fact I couldn't tell if he was being serious or not, but I finally gave in and took out my DS. We played for a good twenty minutes before we eventually got bored of it. Dwayne decided to bring a game that we had already beaten one hundred times so it wasn't that entertaining for us.

"I really do wanna get some work done now Dwayne." I said, putting my DS away.

"Alright, alright." He laughed and got up. "Just don't wanna lose a cool dude to something stupid, that's all."

"Wait, what?" I sat up, hearing that almost out of nowhere. "What are you talking about?" I asked, but he'd already gotten up to another part of the room.

"What the hell did he mean by that?" I asked myself, very confused at the statement. "Does he actually think I'm not gunna be friends with him anymore?" I shook my head. "I don't know where he got that from…"

I looked over toward Ian and Kari one more time, but this time I couldn't take my eyes off of them. They looked so great together, almost like an actual couple. It made me sick with jealousy, but I kept telling myself that this was my choice to make. It wasn't their fault I'm keeping them out of my life now. Unfortunately, I stared at them a few seconds too long, and actually saw them kiss. Even though Kari had told me she had kissed him in the past, actually seeing it was ten times worse. It wasn't anything long, a peck at most, but I could feel myself start to boil up to my breaking point at an incredible pace. I stood up, and made a B line right toward Ian, but thankfully Dwayne cut me off long before I could reach him.

"Whoa whoa whoa, dude!" He said quickly, pushing me back in my seat. "Cool your jets."

I took a really deep breath, trying my best to calm myself down. "This…is getting ridiculous…I thought I was getting better about everything."

"It's not working, man." He insisted. "It's not worth it to kill yourself like this. You need to stop."

"I can't." I stated. "I was getting thrown through loops before and nearly beat the living shit out of Ian…this has to get better, I know it will."

"Well with the face you had you looked like you were gunna take him out again." He said with a small chuckle, but stopped when he noticed I didn't find it very funny. I didn't say anything back to him, so neither of us spoke for a few minutes. What Dwayne said to me minutes earlier finally came back to me, and I decided to ask him about it.

"Dwayne…what did you mean before?" I asked, breaking the silence.

"Mean about what?" He responded.

"You said you didn't wanna 'Lose a cool dude to something stupid.' What did you mean by that?" I said. Dwayne sat back in his chair. Not being one for sensitive conversations, he didn't say anything immediately, looking very uncomfortable in his seat. He cleared his throat a couple times, and eventually spoke an answer.

"You were…well…so quick to toss Ian and Kari out the window…" He began. "I guess…well, you know since we already got into a fight and stuff…I just…I don't wanna lose you man."

I felt my stomach drop when he said that. The tone of his voice was so sincere, almost nothing like his normal upbeat way of speaking. He was legitimately afraid he was the next person for me to break a friendship with. I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

"Dwayne…you're my only friend now." I responded. "What makes you think I'd ever stop being friends with you?"

"Well…look at what happened with Ian, dude." He paused. "You and him were like, best buds or something. Weren't you guys friends since preschool? You always seemed to trust him more than me all the time. I figured if you could move on from him…it could happen to me too."

I put my hand on his shoulder and smiled. "This serious talking stuff doesn't suit you man. You've got nothing to worry about. Trust me, I'm not about to throw my only friend out the door anytime soon."

His eyes seem to light up. "Really?"

"Would you believe me if I bought your lunch today?" I smirked.

"Well that seals it then!" He said, almost jumping out of his chair. Some kids looked over in his direction at the way he was acting. I laughed it off, but my smile disappeared when I noticed out of the corner of my eye that Kari and Ian had gone missing. They were no longer in the classroom, and apparently slipped out while I was having my conversation with Dwayne. I looked at the clock and saw that study hall still had around ten minutes left. Dwayne interrupted my thoughts as he sat back down.

"I'm sorry if I was a downer or anything, dude." I shook my head.

"You were far from it." I replied. "You really helped me get through this week more than you know." I glanced over at Kari and Ian's empty table again.

"You still wanna beat Ian up?" He laughed. I rolled my eyes.

"As much as he deserves it, I'm not gunna do him the honor." I looked over once more, this time Dwayne caught on to my constant glances.

"What are you looking at?" He asked.

"Er…nothing, Dwayne." I said standing up. "I'll be back in a sec, alright?"

"Sure thing man." He said leaning back in his chair. "Period's almost over though. Just thought I'd let you know."

"Thanks." I said as I left the classroom. I looked around the halls the minute I closed the door.

"Where could they have gone?" I asked myself. You'd think I wouldn't care about what they'd be up to, but I was genuinely curious to know where they headed off to. This was a very Ian thing to do, but Kari was too much of a teacher's pet to go skipping any class, including a study hall that for some reason doesn't have a teacher. A thought occurred to me at that moment.

"Don't tell me she's gunna start acting all juvenile like Ian now…" I said to myself, shaking my head. I looked around and gave a puzzled look. "Wait…why the hell do I even care? She's not my problem anymore. Fuck this, I'm heading back to class."

I wanted to head back to study hall before the bell rang as I still had my stuff in the classroom. Having to run back to class, get to my locker, _and _get to gym on time would be a hell of a lot to ask. There really no need to mention it, but being late to gym was _never_ an option either.

On my way back, out of nowhere, I started to hear some noises that weren't very familiar too me and got me to stop walking. I perked up my ears and listened closely. The noises seemed to get quieter, but then I heard a voice that I did recognize. To my surprise it was Kari's. As my eyes brightened up, I looked in all directions, trying to figure out where they were coming from. I was eventually led up to a janitor's closet. I scratched my head at first, not having a close why I was lead here, but my eyes opened incredibly wide when the noises finally made sense to me as I now started to hear two people.

"Those noises…is that…is that moaning?" I didn't want to believe it. I shook my head violently, thinking I could clear my head of any idiotic idea. The sounds started to get very clear to my ears. I could almost picture what was going on inside of that room. My legs started to feel heavy all of a sudden, which forced me to sit down on the floor next to the door. My head started to hurt next as I grabbed it with both hands. Why didn't I get away from there? I was torturing myself if I just sat there and listened to them get to first base. The emotions I was feeling were unexplainable. If I stayed there any longer, I didn't know how I was going to react.

Suddenly, the sounds stopped. The silence made it possible for me to hear my own heartbeat, which was moving at a much faster pace than it should. I picked my head up, feeling relieved that the torture in my mind had finally ended. I was breathing incredibly heavily. It was a struggle to breathe, almost like I was having a panic attack.

"…I think we should get back to class before the end of the period." Kari said from inside the closet. That was my cue to get out of there before they saw me. As I stood up, I had trouble keeping my balance, as my body felt like it was numb. I didn't care and starting running, all the way past the study hall room. There was no way I could look at either of them without the images my mind created showing up and haunting me. I stopped running once I stood in front of my locker. I was nearly out of breath again, this time out of sheer exhaustion, and pounded the locker with both fists like a mindless warrior.

"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" I yelled in sync with my pounding. With the amount of commotion I was causing, surprisingly enough no one in the school had heard me. I eventually stopped my outraged attack on my locker, and leaned against head first. I stood there like that for a minute or two, and heard a voice from behind me.

"H.A.?" Ian asked. "What the hell are you doing out here?"

I didn't turn around, or even give him the decency to answer him. "He wasn't worth it." I kept telling myself over and over.

"C'mon, the least you could do is answer me." He said, a bit of aggravation in his voice. He took a few steps closer to me. "Helloooo? Anyone home?"

I again didn't answer him, and hoped he'd lose interest and go away. My hopes weren't met, however, as I heard him step up right behind me.

"Hey!" He said in a raised tone. "Answer me already! Enough with the damn charades like I don't exist!"

He went to grab my shoulder to turn me around, but I grabbed his arm, threw him against the locker next to me, and pinned him against it. He tried to break my hold, but that only made me push his head hard into the locker. He finally stopped resisting and I stared him dead in the eyes with the most intimidating look I could manage

"I don't know when…I don't know where, but I'm going to beat the living shit out of you." I threatened. He had a look of fear in his eyes for a few seconds, but immediately started to chuckle to himself. I didn't take his joking manner very nicely, and punched the locker only missing his face by a few inches.

"You think I'm fucking joking!" I yelled. He kept the grin on his face.

"Go ahead." He said. "Try it. Just remember one thing…you know that gang you ran into?"

I loosened my grip on him, knowing where this was headed. "You wouldn't…"

He pushed me off of him and dusted off his arms. "Of course I wouldn't. I couldn't do that to a…what did you call it the other day? Oh yeah, a 'formal friend' or whatever you think it is." He started to walk past me. "Just trying to remind you I'm holding the cards here. They still want you dead, and I'm the only one saving you from it. You should be thanking me."

"Thanking you!" I roared in his direction, but I put my fist down and stopped. "Whatever…just stay away from me."

"Whatever you say." He replied, but I shouted to him one more time before he left and he turned around to my attention.

"…How's Kari…" I mumbled, just loud enough for him to hear.

"I thought she 'didn't exist' to you-"

"How is she!" I repeated myself loudly, having a lot of trouble controlling the volume of my voice. He shook his head.

"Pathetic…she's doing good I guess; not sure why you still care."

I took a deep breath. "Look…this whole week has been hell on me. Just give me a straight answer for once."

Ian stared at me in disbelief, his eyes made it seem like his next words were going to be "Are you fucking kidding me?" I didn't understand his look, because I wasn't lying about what I said. He knew I struggled to remain sane throughout the entirety of that week.

"Just remember this…" He began. "You aren't the only one being affected by this shit…which I should remind you is all your fault to begin with."

With that he walked away, and left me without a chance to reply. Even if he gave me a chance to say something, I wouldn't know what it would've been. Was he trying to tell me Kari's charade of happiness wasn't as authentic as it looked? Only seconds later the bell rang, signaling the end of second period. I remembered at that moment that my books were still in study hall. I sighed, knowing that now I was going to be late for gym. Fortunately for me, however, Dwayne came running up to me as I headed back to the classroom.

"Dude!" He said, holding my books. "I figured you weren't coming back to class so I grabbed these for ya."

"Thanks, Dwayne." I said, but my face showed a lot of exhaustion which caught Dwayne's eye.

"Dude…what happened?" He asked. "What'd you go off and do the rest of the study hall?"

"It's nothing." I replied. "Don't worry about it, I'll be fine." When I tried turning back to my locker, Dwayne's arm grabbed me for behind.

"C'mon…" He spoke with that serious tone once again, to which I had no choice to but tell him the truth.

"Alright…I'll tell you on the way to gym." I responded, taking a big sigh. I couldn't help but continue thinking what Ian had told me. If he meant what I thought he meant, I was going to make a move about it at lunch. I was done pretending that neither of them existed. Dwayne was right; it was killing me much more than I originally believed. I had to do something about it, and I knew exactly what to do.

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**And there you have it. Chapter 21 is now in the books. Check back in 2 weeks to see what H.A. plans to do! There weren't any reviews from the last chapter, but that's quite alright. Just remember, I enjoy all kinds of reviews, whether positive or negative. It's always fun to give feedback. Thanks for reading!**


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